be my shield (five times we touched)
by Shadows of a Dream
Summary: he tastes like fire and steel and ash, like a thousand fractured yesterdays. she kisses him harder, long and deep, desperate and damaged, like a promise of tomorrow. - steve/natasha. 5 consecutive one-shots, some longer than others. timeline: post-avengers through post-winter soldier. [edit: the final one-shot has become a multi-chapter concluding arc.] COMPLETE.
1. Castle of Glass (Undone)

The first time they touch, she's broken and he's present, so they can't bring themselves to care about the details.

Steve Rogers hasn't slept in a month. He blames it on having been frozen in the ice for so long. Sleep feels like that — muscles locked, breathing slowed, thoughts swimming, everything drifting. At home, when rest evades him, Steve often slips outside and runs by moonlight until his mind is clear. But here, on a mission from S.H.I.E.L.D. — tracking a potential terrorist operation in Chicago, of all places — he can't afford to be wandering alone at night.

_Blend in, _Fury said during the mission briefing. _It's easy to do that in the city. Don't distinguish yourself. Don't walk the streets with that shield on your back._

_And stay close to Agent Romanoff._

Steve can't help but wonder what Fury was thinking when he planned this mission. Apparently, two hotel rooms would have been too expensive for S.H.I.E.L.D., so Fury decided that Cap and Widow could play happy-married-couple for the week. Steve is not amused, Natasha even less so.

While Captain America was reborn from ice, Black Widow has been tested in fire. She is S.H.I.E.L.D.'s iron fist — elegant and efficient, silent and lethal. She doesn't ask questions; she doesn't follow her feelings. She obeys orders to the letter. She kills with grace and poise, and perhaps with her own personal brand of conscience.

Black Widow is the opposite of Captain America in every possible way. Which, of course, means that Steve's instinct is to be so damn nice to her, it's no wonder the hotel receptionist buys their marriage cover story. Their room, thankfully, is spacious, so Steve can pace freely while Natasha sleeps in the bed.

Outside, the sky is heavy with gathering clouds. When the first lash of lightning whips across the sky, it heralds an immediate downpour. Rain breaks loose in blinding sheets. A boom of thunder follows; it reminds Steve of the crashing skyscrapers during what shall forever be called "The Loki Incident."

_Even if I _could_ sleep, _he thinks, _I wouldn't find rest tonight._

Natasha, on the other hand, appears unperturbed by the storm outside. As soon as their luggage is unloaded, she shuts the lights and says, curtly, "See you tomorrow, Rogers."

Not Steve, not even Captain, but _Rogers — _it makes Steve's fists clench. And without another word, Black Widow falls asleep, as though the sheets of rain and smashing thunder were a lullaby.

Steve sighs. For once, Fury has made a mistake. If he thinks that pairing Steve with Natasha on this assignment is amusing, his smile will fade when he hears what's guaranteed to be a very messy mission report. The Avengers Initiative was one thing; working alone with Natasha Romanoff is quite another.

As Steve paces the night away, making a circle of footprints in the carpet, he thinks, _It would be easier to keep my distance._

But when Natasha starts screaming — real, terrible screams, half-strangled in the back of her throat — any thought of disengaging dissolves, and he finds himself running to her side.

He isn't prepared for what he sees.

Natasha is drenched in sweat, her muscles pulled tightly against her body — like a child, huddled small and strong, braced against the evil figments of the dark. And she's shaking. Black Widow, _shaking_, like the monsters are coming and there's nowhere to hide.

"Natasha," Steve says. A touch might wake her, but the nightgown she's wearing is so thin, and she's breathing so _fast, _and she's unconscious, after all. Touching her now would feel like a violation. Steve whispers her name again, sharply, leaning close to her ear. "_Natasha_."

And then her eyes are open, and Steve doesn't have time to react before her fingernails are at his throat, her knees pressing on his ribs, and he's pinned down on the bed and she's hanging over him, tense and feral and barely breathing, and he looks into her eyes, he looks and he looks but there's _nothing there_.

"Na–ta–sha." He's choking.

She looks at him, then — really looks at him — and understanding floods her gaze. With a gasp, she releases his throat. She withdraws abruptly, stumbling back across the bed, smashing the back of her skull on the headboard in the process.

Steve's heart bangs against his ribcage. He lays still, breathing hard, not daring to speak. Blood has rushed to his face, hot hot _hot, _whether from the sweeping shock of the situation or the recent proximity of Black Widow's body, he doesn't know.Cautiously, he dares to glance in her direction.

Natasha sags against the headboard, her gaze wild, and takes sharp, short breaths. Eventually, she closes her eyes.

A minute passes; neither of them move. Then Steve straightens, taking a seat on the edge of the bed. His throat burns from Natasha's fingernails, but he ignores the pain. Hardly daring to hope, wishing the thought didn't comfort him, he looks at her haggard face and asks, "You have them, too?"

Natasha's eyes snap open. "Have what?"

Steve crosses his arms, his biceps visibly tightening. "When I manage to sleep, Natasha, did you think I have pleasant dreams?"

His words strike her more sharply than he anticipated. Black Widow presses her nails into her palms. She doesn't speak, doesn't even look at him.

His pulse pounding, Steve powers through. "Who else knows?"

"Knows?"

"About the night terrors."

"They don't happen often." Natasha takes a sharp breath. "Only Clint knows." She pauses before adding, "He's never actually... seen it. Seen me like that."

A flash of lightning illuminates the room, and for an instant, Steve sees a single tear on Natasha's cheek — a delicate, defiant thing. She wipes it away with the back of a hand, as if it never was.

"I'm sorry," she says as darkness returns. "I hurt you."

"No, I'm fine," Steve says. But when he touches his stinging throat, his fingers come away with blood. Natasha winces. "You weren't you," he insists. "It's fine."

Natasha laughs — a slick, dark sound. "You overestimate my character."

"You underestimate my insight."

A minute passes with hardly a sound; only rain against the windows, like tiny claws tapping.

"Tell me, Rogers." Natasha moves, shifts, so that she's sitting beside him, like a shadow in the dim light. "What do you see, when you're alone in the dark?"

Steve closes his eyes, his stomach tightening. After a pause, he chokes out an answer – a word, a name, that burns his lungs on way out. "Bucky."

Natasha arches an eyebrow. "Am I supposed to know who that is?"

"One of my Howling Commandos." Steve pauses; takes a breath. "And a friend."

"You lost him."

"Yes."

"You blame yourself," Natasha says. And it isn't a question.

Steve lowers his head. Memories roll over him like the thunderclaps outside. "Yes," he says, and he wants to say something else, too, but then he makes a mistake and thinks of Bucky – Bucky, grinning, rifle held high – and everything inside of him grinds together, like even his post-serum body isn't big enough to contain such _emptiness._

Time drags past, every second chafing.

Natasha's breath is warm against Steve's neck, tickling the edges of his cuts. A strange warmth shudders down his spine. "Steve," she says, in a voice that disarms him.

With difficulty, he meets her eyes. He's surprised to find them soft, vulnerable, as though layers of her have been sanded away. Nothing about Black Widow has ever been vulnerable, but her eyes are.

Steve read somewhere that eyes are windows to the soul.

Natasha averts her gaze. Softly, she says, "It doesn't ever stop, you know."

The phantom pain. The dreams. The void inside of him.

"I know," Steve says, and for a moment, they understand each other. Not touching, not talking, they listen to the thunder.

Neither the soldier nor the spy breaks their fragile, precious moment of simply _being_. They're always running, fighting, _reacting_; to simply _exist,_ as a small thing in an infinite universe, is a privilege. Steve doesn't want to steal it away.

With a start, it dawns on Steve that they're so very, very close in the dark. Through her thin nightgown, Steve can feel the warmth of Natasha's thigh beside his own. It makes his pulse spike.

He looks at her face — at her scarlet curls and her sharp jaw and her suddenly haunted eyes — and he wonders how this woman, so beautifully intense, could have a nightmare powerful enough to make her scream.

"What do you see, Natasha? In the dreams?"

She doesn't have to answer him. Even if she chooses to, she's a practiced deceiver; she could weave any web of lies she pleased, and Steve would never ask again.

But instead, Natasha braces empty palms against the mattress. She squeezes her eyes shut, then opens them again.

"Myself," Black Widow says, not blinking. "Always."

Steve grasps for a reply, but then she starts talking again, and once she starts she can't stop.

"The whole world is red, I'm dripping red, and I don't even know whose blood it is. And there's a shadow chasing me, and I'm running and running but it always runs faster, and then it's on top of me, screaming, and when I pull the trigger and put a bullet through its heart, I watch it die. And it has my face. And I watch me bleed, and the sick part is, I'm not even sorry. And I wake up and I'm screaming."

Outside their window, lighting flashes. Brightness cuts across Natasha's face for the briefest instant before they're enfolded in darkness again. She won't cry again; that much is certain. But in that instant of illumination, Steve sees her for what she is. Hollowed out. Bled dry.

Without thinking, Steve puts an arm around her shoulder.

He expects Natasha to pull away, to set strict limits for physical contact and establish ground rules for the next week and so forth, but instead, she leans into his chest. She rests her head where his heart beats, listening to his racing pulse. And she really doesn't mind that they're close, _too close_, sitting together on her freaking bed in the middle of damn Chicago.

It's better than being alone with herself.

Some people say that Captain America is only a shield. And right now, maybe it's true, but he's one hell of a shield, his arms strong and secure around her, his heartbeat rapid but steady against her ear, like the rain.

Or like a lullaby.

It's the first time they touch, and she's broken and he's present, so they can't bring themselves to care about the details. Black Widow puts an arm over Captain America's shoulder, gripping the taut muscle beneath, and closes her eyes.

For tonight, at least, he'll keep her nightmares away.

**~x~X~x~**

**A/N: **This will be a series of five one-shots, solely because I need an outlet for my Cap/Widow emotions after watching WINTER SOLDIER in theaters for the second time. This chapter ran away into major angst territory, so don't expect this kind of length from every installment. Some of those upcoming chapters might be more along the lines of drabbles or vignettes, not full-blown sequences with backstory like this one.

This might be a little bit angsty for the characterization of these two – I'm very new to superhero movies, so you'll have to bear as I try to touch on this wonderful, layered couple that I can't get out of my head – but I did my best to ground it in what we know about them.

What I love about Cap/Widow is that they're both strong, but they both have vulnerabilities, and I wanted to portray that here. Missing Bucky is Steve's greatest burden. Natasha has done things she regrets; she has "red on her ledger," and as she told Hawkeye/Clint, she knows what it's like to feel like your head has been replaced with someone else's, to do things you thought you never could. Until this scene, I imagine that Cap & Widow largely bonded due to mutual respect for one another's abilities; this scene is the first time they bond over mutual pain, mutual brokenness. And so it's the first time they truly _connect._

Please review, if you have the time – and truly, thank you for reading!

_**Song for this chapter: Castle of Glass (Linkin Park)**_


	2. C'est la mort (Dog Days Are Over)

**A/N: **I've decided to list two songs per chapter — I stumbled upon a forgotten one in the depths of my iPod, UNDONE (FFH), and can't believe how perfect it was for chapter one. So. Perfect.

Thanks and hugs for my reviewers: **That-girl-from-outer-space6, Fuinn13, MESPX13, MysticFantasy, TheFreelancerSeal, Vak, DaughterOfPoseidon333, Rosa Cotton, Mandarin Fiend, Skewbald, and the two Guest reviewers.**

Also, much thanks to my followers (almost 50!), as well as those who are reacting on Figment (only one so far, but hopefully, there will be more eventually.)

And a great big shout-out to **MysticFantasy**, who added this story to a community under the Avengers category: "the soldier and the spy". Thank you!

Readers, your combined enthusiasm has truly made the past several days that much more wonderful, and I'd be lying if I said it didn't encourage me to update quickly.

Lastly, this story is now double-posted (on under Shadows of a Dream, and also on Figment under Laura Genn.) Just a heads-up. If some or all of the reviewers' names seem out of place, they're probably from the other website.

Without further ado, I give you chapter 2. What do you know – it's longer than chapter one. Forget what I said about a short update. XD

Also, it's 23 minutes to 1:00 AM right now, but I swore to myself that I'd post this today (so please excuse any typos I may have missed, and feel free to notify me of them so I can edit them later.) **EDIT: Posted the rough draft by accident... I need to sleep. Here's the revised version.**

**~x~X~x~**

The second time they touch, she's drunk and he's lying about not wanting to kiss her, and God forgive him for entertaining the thought.

Steve Rogers and Natasha Romanoff have a complicated relationship. It's been nearly two years since the first night of the Chicago affair — since he held her in the dark and she fell asleep in his arms — but that's all it was, one night, and they kept their clothes _on_ and their mouths _apart_ and their hands strictly_ to themselves_, because it wasn't about sex, or even about mere attraction. It was about nightmares, about the broken things in both of them, and really, Steve should talk to what's-her-name from Statistics because he and Natasha are strictly platonic.

On the other hand, Steve can't fault anyone for making assumptions.

Lately, Natasha works with him whenever Clint Barton is unavailable. Steve doesn't know if it's at Fury's direction or her own private whims. He can't bring himself to ask. In the past months, Black Widow has become more than his opposite. She is beginning to feel like his shadow, inexplicably ever-present, guarding his back without explanation.

Truth be told, Steve likes it that way. He likes trusting (anticipating) that her twin pistols will cover his back. He likes teasing her in the quiet moments between conflicts. He likes never being able to predict how she'll react under pressure, and he likes that he's always impressed.

By trying to shed light on _exactly what they are,_ Steve knows that he would frighten his shadow away. So they don't talk about it. For the time being, they're allies: nothing more, nothing less.

But that doesn't stop Steve's heart from clenching when Natasha sees the body.

Nick Fury, the beating heart of S.H.I.E.L.D. — Nick Fury, snuffed out into endless, endless silence.

If S.H.I.E.L.D. is a family, then Fury was its father.

Natasha looks at his corpse – absurdly still, both eyes closed, no eye patch needed. She looks and looks, not blinking. She lays an open palm against Fury's forehead, and her eyes say, _Wake up, Nick. You have to wake up._

"_Natasha_..." Steve says her name, low and fierce, the way he did in Chicago, like he's trying to tear her from a nightmare's grip; but this is real, and Nick Fury is dead, and when Natasha shoves past Steve's outstretched arm — out the room, down the hall, starting to run once she thinks no one will see — Steve knows she's crying on the inside.

Steve Rogers and Natasha Romanoff have a complicated relationship. He knows that she can compartmentalize, but not forever. He knows that she'll need to talk tonight, but that she won't say a word; he knows the first sound she'll make is when she wakes up screaming. He knows that he should go to see her, and that she'll tell him to get the hell out of her house, and that he'll have to stay until the swearing stops and time somehow slows and they can just _talk_, like they did in Chicago.

Steve Rogers drives to her apartment with singular purpose, convinced that he knows exactly what to expect. It goes without saying that, when Natasha opens the door — hair disheveled, face flushed, but otherwise, the picture of total calm — Steve has no idea what to do. She doesn't look sorrowful; she looks... _relaxed_.

"What's the matter, Captain? Didn't want to sleep alone tonight?"

Blinking, Steve does a double take. "Natasha?" he says, like he called the wrong phone number by accident (which has happens with _smart phones _more than he'd like to admit.)

She arches an eyebrow. "Expecting someone else?"

He doesn't say anything, only stands there. Dumbstruck.

"Well?" she slurs, her hands on her hips. "You're staring, Captain. See something you like?"

"Um..." Steve says, looking over her shoulder to the room beyond. There's a bottle of vodka on the table. It's open, circled by assorted shot glasses. He swallows. "You're drunk, Natasha."

"I'm sober as hell," she says, eyes glazed. "It's cheap vodka."

"Cheap vodka is still vodka."

"I'm Russian."

"So?"

Natasha crosses her arms, defiant. "I am not drunk," she says, the words running together. "I am not drunk on cheap American vodka."

"Your stomach might disagree in the morning."

Silence falls between them.

Steve looks at Natasha, past the haze of alcohol and into the wounded woman beneath. For the first time, he can read her like a book. He has never seen her like this — entirely vulnerable, every emotion pulsing right beneath the surface, as though they could bleed out at the slightest touch. She's fractured and grief-stricken and angry, and she's so far gone that he's not even sure she realizes it.

"Why are you here, Captain?"

"To talk to you."

Natasha's gaze travels over his chest, taking in every inch of chiseled muscle. "Is that all?"

"Yes," Steve says, his face burning. He takes a step away. "And if you don't want to talk, I'll go home."

Natasha pauses, processing. Then she says, thickly, "Let me pour you a shot."

If he can get past her drunken stupor, if he can get into her head, maybe he can help. Maybe he can make this miserable day better.

"All right," Steve says on impulse. "And then you'll talk to me?"

"Shot first."

"Then talk to me."

"Fine."

Steve follows Natasha into the kitchen. She sways slightly as she walks, like a fallen leaf in the wind, but she can walk a straight line, nevertheless. Steve wonders if Russians really do have a higher tolerance for alcohol.

"You like vodka, Captain?"

"I don't know," he admits. "It's never been my drink of choice."

Natasha reaches for the bottle with one hand, choosing a shot glass with the other. "Sorry this is the cheap stuff," she drawls. "Long day."

Steve shrugs as he takes a seat. "I don't mind."

Natasha struggles with the cap of the vodka. Apparently, she tightened it too much after her last shot. Her eyes are blank. Glassy.

"I'm sorry," Steve says. "About Fury."

At that, Natasha's fingers clench around the bottle. The cap pops loose and falls to the table, clinking. She turns her head and looks, not at him but through him.

"Soviet-made," she says through her teeth.

"What?"

"The bullet."

Steve's throat closes up. He knows precious little of Black Widow's past, but he knows enough. He knows that she's aided the Soviet regime, far more than she's ever fought against it. He knows that it haunts her every day.

"Natasha —"

"Nick let me stay," she slurs, tipping the bottle towards the shot glass. "S.H.I.E.L.D. was his. Clint should've killed me, but he saved me. And Nick let me stay."

Vodka slips over the rim of the shot glass, spilling on to the table.

"He wouldn't blame you," Steve says, even as he reaches for a roll of paper towels. "Don't blame yourself."

"You do."

"What?"

"I remember, Captain." Abruptly, her gaze is lucid. Searching. "I remember about Bucky... what you said."

_Bucky_. Steve's chest clamps. The guilt is killing him, eating him away in every hour, every minute, and he knows it. He doesn't want that sort of half-life for Natasha. She deserves better... She deserves freedom —

She is still pouring vodka into the shot glass.

_Damn it._

Steve throws a wad of paper towels on to the mess.

"Don't do what I do, Natasha," he says, the scent of the alcohol making his head spin. "Don't spend your life listening for echoes of yesterday."

Suddenly, Natasha seems to realize that a significant amount of vodka has been donated to her kitchen table. She sets the bottle down, sliding the shot glass towards Steve. "Drink your shot, Captain."

Steve does. It stings on the way down, burning the skin of his throat. It's far worse than he expected; it tastes like rubbing alcohol. He chokes, almost gags, but swallows the shot.

Steve blinks, his vision fuzzy at the edges. "Why the hell would anyone drink straight vodka?"

"You just did," Natasha says.

_Because I'm an idiot._

Steve's stomach does a somersault. Some of it must show on his face, because Natasha laughs, long and tipsy, and Steve can't help but laugh with her — and somehow, in that moment of time, everything and nothing is all right.

Their laughter fades into silence. Seconds pass, neither of them speaking.

Then Natasha blinks.. Confused, she asks, "Why are you here?"

"I already told you."

"You did not."

"Fine," Steve sighs, setting down his shot glass. "You win. I didn't."

Natasha rolls her eyes. "Of course you didn't."

She tries to sit, but she moves too fast, landing on a chair's edge. As the chair slides back, she starts to slip.

Unthinking, Steve moves to catch her — and he does, but she's heavier than he anticipated, and the shot of straight vodka has addled his brain.

They fall together. All at once, Steve is on his back with Natasha on top of him, breathing hard, loose strands of her scarlet hair teasing his face. Their lips are inches apart. She looks at him, eyebrows raised, like she doesn't remember how she got there.

She smiles wickedly. "If you wanted to speed things up, Captain, all you had to do was ask."

There's vodka on her breath. Her eyes hold his, framed by dark, delicate lashes.

It would be so easy to kiss her. Instead, Steve rises to his feet before helping Natasha to do the same. She leans on his shoulder, panting.

"You should lie down," he says.

"Want to join me?"

Steve kicks himself for hesitating "_No_," he says. "Come on." And he stumbles toward her bedroom, Natasha leaning on his arm. Her fingers tighten around his bicep. He tries to ignore it, but his heart races.

When they finally reach Natasha's room, she all but falls on to the mattress, completely wasted. Steve watches her for a few seconds. Then he turns to leave.

Behind him, she whispers, "You don't like me."

"That's not true."

"Fury didn't like me, either."

He turns. Looks her in the eyes. "Natasha –"

"This is how it is, Captain... you and me... alone in the world." She pauses, bleary-eyed, before announcing, "I need another shot."

"No, you don't."

"_Like hell I don't._"

Without warning, Natasha lurches to her feet, but another shot is the last thing she needs, and Steve moves to black her path. When she tries to shove past, she collides with his chest instead. They're frozen, eye to eye. Skin against skin.

Natasha lifts an open palm to Steve's neck, where his pulse pounds. She leans closer to him, her lips gently parting.

"Kiss me," she slurs.

Steve's breath hitches. "You're drunk."

His flat refusal only angers her further. Natasha digs her nails into his shirt, gathering the fabric in her fists. "Kiss me, Steve," she says.

Steve's heartbeat courses through his whole body. He's only human; he only has so much restraint. _She's beautiful,_ he thinks, and in this moment he realizes how much she means to him. She is beautiful, but she is more than that. She is brave, strong, dignified, enduring. She is impossibly valuable. Too valuable to give herself away in a drunken stupor.

Steve swallows. "I don't want to kiss you."

"You don't?" she says, her breath hot against his mouth.

"I don't," he says.

It's the second time they touch, and she's drunk and he's lying about not wanting to kiss her, and God forgive him for entertaining the thought. She's not in her right mind, and he refuses to do something she'll regret in the morning. He's willing to wait until another day – a day when she's sober, and they're standing in the daylight, and she asks him to kiss her in full view of the world. And when that day comes, he will.

Natasha sinks down to her the mattress. Dejected. Tears streak her flushed face, tears she will not remember in the morning. Steve murmurs an apology, then turns away before she can touch him again. He's outside in half a minute. The air is cold, but his skin is burning.

With a sigh, Steve Rogers leans back against the apartment door. He could have kissed her — easily. Could have leaned forward and captured her mouth with his. Could have held her flush against him in the dark.

He came so close, and he walked away. He's proud; he's shattered. He tells himself, _She'd probably taste like alcohol._

He probably wouldn't mind.

**~x~X~x~**

**A/N: **Hopefully, when Black Widow says, "Kiss me," on the escalator in WINTER SOLDIER, you will never hear it the same way again. Steve, according to my mental canon (including the story as canon,) remembers the drunk Black Widow incident; Natasha presumably spent the night puking, took a science-fiction anti-hangover pill in the morning, and resumed the movie as we know it with _no recollection of these events. _So when Black Widow says, "Kiss me," on that escalator, maybe she is just trying to keep them alive, or maybe not – regardless, it makes Steve remember this, and that's part of why he hesitates.

Anyway...

I've had quite an awkward time googling types of alcohol, how much vodka one needs to get drunk, what straight vodka tastes like (sounds nasty!), symptoms of inebriation, and so on. I'm not even seventeen, so I won't be trying any alcoholic beverages for a very long time. And let's face it: getting drunk is stupid, anyway.

Thanks: to my sister, who provided several ideas for this chapter, to my friend Scott, for suggesting the cheap vodka gag, and to my father, for advising that Natasha refer to it as cheap American vodka in particular.

Please review, and thank you for reading. It really does mean the world.

_**Songs for this chapter: **_**1. C'est la mort (The Civil Wars) 2. Dog Days Are Over (Florence + the Machine)**

The next chapter will probably be the shortest of the projected five. Hopefully, I'll be writing it soon!


	3. Here We Are (We Fall Apart)

**A/N: **On fanfic, hugs for all my reviewers on chapter 2: **GSMemorial18, nkowaliuk, Skewbald, chat noire, That-girl-from-outer-space6, sleeplessinbudapest **(something tells me you're a Clintasha shipper? xD), **Jaing Li, MESPX13 **(who left my first review in a language I don't speak – _so cool_!), **Littlesister007, madman42**, and **Christina.**

Thanks to all of my followers (or in the case of Figment, those who hit reaction buttons) as well! And a final freakout to show my apprecation for **theAnGerFlarE, **who added this story to another community on fanfic: **A****vengers Assemble!**

I am _**so honored**_ by the sheer number of follows and favorites that this story has amassed. It's amazing and exciting and makes me want to run in circles and flail. Thank you!

In response to some questions pointed out by my reviewers:

**madman42: I thought alcohol didn't effect Steve after he became Captain America? **To be honest, I completely forgot about that; it's been a whole year since I watched the first Captain America film. I should re-watch it ASAP. My response to this would be that I never said Steve was drunk, only somewhat frazzled (as anyone would be, at least briefly, after drinking a straight vodka shot!)

**sleeplessinbudapest: Is she going to forget this in the morning and Steve pretending it never happened? **I addressed this in the author's note. Natasha has no recollection of this in the morning, but Steve does.

**chat noire: Just one thing, Fury died at 1 am, and then right away Steve was taken to the Triskelion, then he had the elevator fight, before heading back to the hospital. So your timeline doesn't work out to well. **You may have actually found a plot hole in my story. My best explanation (and this might still not work, in which case you'll have to accept my timeline as fanon,) Steve had the elevator fight, then went to see Natasha, and in the morning he went back to the hospital. But off the top of my head, I really can't remember if that would work or not. You're probably correct that I made a mistake. Oh, well... such is life, right?

On to chapter 3!

**~x~X~x~**

The third time they touch, she's lost in the wake of the winter ghost, but then the soldier (_her _soldier) presses his lips to hers, and all she knows is that she's home.

Natasha Romanoff has suffered bullet wounds before. It's a special brand of pain, shooting through every nerve; it takes her back to smoking skies and infernal flames, licking at a shattered dawn. It takes her back to the beginning, forever ago (_only yesterday_), when S.H.I.E.L.D. had every reason to end her life.

Natasha Romanoff has suffered bullet wounds before. But that only makes it worse, because memories ache like shrapnel.

This time, she's sprinting through the streets, screaming for civilians to run. Then it happens – the telltale crack; the piercing pain. It happens so _fast _that Natasha really does scream (_or is it only in my mind?_), and for an instant she's in Russia: a different girl with a different name, but a weapon nevertheless.

Then and now, all she knows is the need to survive.

Natasha staggers, slumping against the side of an abandoned car. Her breaths come in gasps. She presses a palm to her shoulder, trying to test the wound's severity. At the pressure, she nearly screams.

She must survive this.

On the bridge_, _the winter ghost reloads his rifle. _Click. Click._

Natasha's legs are locked in place, her teeth gritted against the pain. She looks down at her hand. Blood stains her fingertips, brilliantly red. The world tilts, blurring, a tumult of real and unreal, and she's running and there's a shadow and it has _her face, _her eyes and her hair and her _hate_ —

She blinks.

Blood. On her fingers.

_Can you wipe out that much red?_

Survive. That's all she needs to do.

_Your ledger, it's dripping, it's gushing red —_

The winter ghost takes aim.

A bloodstain blooms and spreads, red red _red,_ making Natasha's shirt cling to the bullet. Taking sharp breaths, she closes her eyes. A whisper slithers through her mind.

_You lie and kill, in the service of liars and killers._

She doesn't deserve to survive this. If she were smarter, she'd accept it, but all Natasha knows how to do is fight.

When Steve appears, shield in hand, to grapple with the ghost — she fights the urge to collapse, and instead stands. When the ghost's mask is torn away, and he wears the face that haunts Steve's dreams — she fights the screaming pain in her shoulder, and instead lifts a rifle. When she sees the light leave Steve's eyes, and his hand goes slack around the shield — she fights the urge to flinch, and instead fires.

The bullet hits its mark.

Their subsequent escape is a blur, everything seen through a veil of red. Natasha is still fighting against herself as they drive out of the chaos. She wants to close her eyes, but she won't. Because she has survived, and there is no shadow, and the blood on her hand is _hers_, not someone else's.

Because Steve's nightmare has been made flesh, and she can't leave him to face the implications alone.

With every jerk of the car, anguish shoots through Natasha's shoulder. Minutes swing by, fast and slow at the same time.

And then they're in a safe place (_is anywhere safe anymore?_), and Steve says something about how she lost a lot of blood, and Maria Hill asks her a question — _are you okay, Agent Romanoff? _— and Natasha tries to answer, but she can't. The words form on her tongue, but their meaning is lost to her. All at once, the floor lurches forward, and she lands on her wounded shoulder, and she screams and it _hurts_and there's red, red, _red _—

And then there's only dark.

**~x~X~x~**

"Is she awake yet?"

Steve's voice, strong. It breaks through the dark, lifting her out of the nothingness.

Another voice, female. "I'm afraid not, Captain. You were right — she lost a lot of blood."

"I need to see her."

"She's unconscious."

Natasha tries to open her eyes, but her whole body feels heavy, like her blood has turned to metal.

"Then I'll wait beside her, until she wakes up. But with all due respect, Agent Hill, I need to see her."

Silence. Then, the door opening.

"You have five minutes, Captain."

"Thank you."

Natasha breathes shallowly. Steve takes a seat beside her cot; she hears the chair creak as he does so. For the longest time, unable to open her eyes, she listens to his ragged breathing.

When he says her name, it's broken. A knife wrenched from his chest.

"Natasha..." He tucks her hair behind her ear, his fingertip brushing her skin, dancing along the edge of her cheekbone. "I'm sorry."

He is earnest, unguarded (_a web of exposed nerves, everything laid bare._) His raw honesty rattles every part of her, reviving a trickle of strength that she never knew she had. In a flash of conviction, she reaches out and grips his hand.

"Natasha." He grips back, firm, like he could force life back into her; and maybe he can, because somehow she opens her eyes.

"Hey, Rogers," she says.

His hand is warm, his smile blinding. "Hey," he says.

"The ghost... Did Agent Hill —"

"He got away."

"Damn."

They look at each other, their silence charging the air.

Steve swallows. "You're all right," he says, loosing a breath. "I was worried."

"I'm always all right," she says, but she's lying.

"I don't..." He runs a hand through his hair, and for the briefest instant, he looks lost. "I don't know what I would have done, if you —"

"It takes more than a ghost to kill me, Rogers."

"I know," he says. He looks at their interlocked hands. "I know."

In matters like this, Natasha is not naive; she has seduced men on missions, allowed them to come so very, very close in order to take their lives. But this is a different kind of touch. This is heat and hope and want. She looks at their interwoven fingers (_such a trivial thing_,) and her face burns.

Steve must see it; he releases her hand.

Natasha straightens, propping herself up on her good arm. "What happened?" she asks. "While I was out?"

"Agent Hill took you to surgery," Steve says. "They removed the bullet. Closed the wound."

_Surgery_. But the bullet was in her shoulder — it went right through her clothes. Which means...

Pulse pounding, Natasha looks down. "Damn it!"

Her dark jeans are intact, if not somewhat damaged from the skirmish; her shirt and leather jacket, however, are absent. She's alone in a recovery room with Captain America, and she's _in a freaking bra_.

"As I expected." Steve smirks, shifting in his chair. "You would look terrible in a bikini."

"Get me a damn shirt, Rogers."

"I'm tempted to refuse."

Natasha raises her eyebrows. "That would've been frowned upon in the forties."

"Indecent," he says.

"Shameful," she says.

Steve leans down suddenly, his lips barely brushing hers. At first, Natasha is too caught off guard to react, but then something snaps into place and _she's _kissing _him_, rough and reckless. Her shoulder throbs, but the pain is faraway (_and so is the rest of the world_).

It's the third time they touch, and when the soldier (_her _soldier) presses his lips to hers, all she knows is that she's home.

When Steve withdraws, her face is flushed. They stare at each other, breathing hard. In the silence, Natasha is acutely aware of her state of partial undress.

"Good thing it's the twenty-first century," Steve says. And then, as though nothing happened, he slips outside to ask Agent Hill for an extra shirt.

**~x~X~x~**

**A/N: **A few things I'd like to point out. 1: If Natasha's thought process seems a bit fractured during my narration of her battle with the Winter Soldier, that's because I went back to the PTSD thread, which I began in chapter 1 with Steve & Natasha's nightmares. She had a moment of flashback, where dreams and reality sort of collided; she legitimately wasn't entirely sure where she was. Hopefully, I conveyed that well; if not, now you know what the heck was going on.

2: My aforementioned friend Scott pointed out to me that according to comic book canon (I've only ever read like 4 comic books in my life, so I trust him on this,) Black Widow has anti-aging powers and _is actually as old as Captain America. _Another reason to ship it? You bet. I don't know if I'll ever have the chance to work this into the fanfic, but we'll see. Scott also helped to inform me a little bit about Black Widow's comic-centric past; I'm not using much of that, but I'm drawing on it for her flashbacks to working for Russia.

3: I was going to do a thing for this chapter where Steve and Natasha shop for clothes in order to go undercover (right before the mall sequence with the unforgettable _escalator kiss._) It ended up looking very fluffy, not serious at all, and more of a crackfic, though, so I stuffed the outline into another document. Maybe I'll write it if I ever get bored.

4: Chapter 4 will still take place during Winter Soldier. Chapter 5 will take place after the film, and so relies on my speculation regarding what happened afterward.

5: I'm finally getting involved in the Marvel fandom! I've now seen both Captain America films, the first two Iron Man films, the first two episodes of AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D., and the Avengers. I'm planning on watching Iron Man 3 as soon as I can get my hands on a copy, and two of my friends are thinking about having a sleepover where they initiate me into the Thor films. (I'm working on it; no spoilers please!)

_**Songs for this chapter: **_**1. Here We Are (Breaking Benjamin) 2. We Fall Apart (We As Human)**


	4. Shattered (Unintended)

**A/N: **There's a lot of things to say before I post chapter 4, so please bear with me. :)

**1:** This story has reached _**over one hundred followers**_on fanfic. There are no words to describe the squealing noise I made when I realized that, for the first time, the follower count on something I wrote made it into the triple digits. I'm honored and amazed and want to hug all of you! In particular, thanks to **rowergal **for being the hundredth follower. But of course, there's enough hugs for everyone.

**2:** The next chapter of this will be an important **author's note **before I write/post chapter 5, the last installment. **I will be running a contest for those of you who have artistic abilities.****If you can draw (or Photoshop,) you might want to take a look. **Details to come; keep your eyes open!

**3:** Further thanks goes out to my wonderful reviewers, **Christina, Fuinn13, RushmanNatalie **(love that username, by the way,) **That-girl-from-outer-space6, Skewbald, MESPX13, Rosa Cotton, Littlesister007, sleeplessinbudapest **(I feel your pain; I was shipping Clintasha until Captasha stole my heart, and I sort of still am, so I'm equally doomed,) **InNeedOfInspiration, Drennilrem, mildlyholmes **(you guys should read their Cap/Natasha fanfic, IN BETWEEN... it's beautiful,) **Fhockey42, **and **The Freelancer Seal **(I've missed you!... and as always, love the detailed feedback.)

**4: **Okay, deep breath... On to answering any relevant reviewer questions/comments. If I miss anything by **MESPX13, **I apologize, but I have to translate all your messages... and I tend to forget what they said. :P Darn language gap. It's still super cool that you're reviewing, though!

**RushmanNatalie: I didn't think she had the serum in this universe but now I feel like she does in the movie she was way to okay in the end after being shot... I think she healed.**

I never noticed that; I totally support that theory!

**Drennilrem: So that last line...I totally didn't expect that to be coming from Steve. If anyone, I'd have thought Cap would be the embarrassed one, but I guess the 40s weren't that prudish.**

I put a lot of thought into that "Good thing it's the 21st century" line, actually. My thoughts on it: First of all, we know that Cap occasionally musters the boldness to be candid (and even flirty) with Natasha. Examples: When she mentions how she doesn't wear bikinis, and Steve says, "I'm sure you'd look terrible in them." When she asks if it was his first kiss since 1945, and his response is that he _isn't dead _(that line cracks me up.) Also, I finally got around to buying my first comic book – it takes place right after Cap is revived from the ice – and there's a scene where he's sharing a drink with Tony Stark, and there are some girls of questionable character hanging out with them. Tony says something like, "Thought you'd be too straight-laced for this," to which Steve replies, "I'm probably blushing, but I'm not complaining."

So... given Steve's moments of boldness, given his straightforward honesty, and given the growing trust between Natasha and himself, I thought that the line fit, especially seeing as he still does the chivalrous thing: he leaves to get Natasha a shirt. (Of course, you're welcome to disagree with me!)

**All right... on to what amounts to my longest Captasha chapter to date (and easily the hardest to write.) I was awake until 1 AM yesterday, trying to finish the last sequence because I promised myself I would post by today. Anyway, let me know what you think!**

**~x~X~x~**

The fourth time they touch, it should be the end, but it feels like a beginning.

Natasha Romanoff is trained to follow orders. Her childhood as a Red Room acolyte was, at its core, a conflict between submission and rebellion. She was a tool, a loaded pistol in the hands of the Soviet regime, her targets carefully selected — but she fired of her own accord.

Even now, she still remembers sneaking back to the training room after dark, silent as a vapor. She remembers rehearsing her combat exercises, over and over until they were branded into her bones. She remembers her instructions, the echoes of which would linger long into the night.

_More speed, more power. Do it again, Natalia. Don't do it right; do it better. More speed, Natalia. Do it again. Again. Again..._

She grew older, of course. Years of repetition only drove her learning deeper, like nails hammered into her flesh. Every night, cloistered among the other women of the Red Room, she closed her eyes and recited her lessons.

_Fulfill expectations, but subvert them. Obey orders, but exceed them. Become everything that is needed, and nothing that is expected._

Natasha is designed for obedience, forged for success through a crucible of struggle and loss. She adapts to each mission seamlessly, like water molding to the shape of a glass. But apart from an assignment — apart from a challenge to overcome — she is undefined, spread too thin, her identity a maze of contradictions.

A lesser operative might have been overcome by the sweeping chaos of HYDRA's resurrection; but when Natasha receives a new assignment from Maria Hill, she is honestly relieved.

"Sam Wilson is still inside the Triskelion. He's engaged with Agent Rumlow. There's a damaged helicarrier on a collision path with their location."

A directive: extract the Falcon. Natasha holsters her pistol. Like a bird upon the wind, she's in her element again.

**~x~X~x~**

Sam Wilson is intact, but the Triskelion is burning. As their helicopter lurches away, Natasha Romanoff turns to catch one last glimpse of the once-great S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters. It is a battered colossus, a funeral pyre against what ought to have been a strikingly blue sky.

It is a monument to all she has ever had, and all she has now lost.

Falcon and Fury banter. Taunts and laughs are exchanged, and something about the floor numbers not being painted on the outside of the building.

Natasha presses an open palm to the window. The sky beyond is a cataclysm of smoke and fire and shattered glass. Her thoughts scatter and strike like a spray of bullets, each revelation a fresh rush of pain.

The Triskelion, falling to ashen memory. S.H.I.E.L.D., cloven in two as if by the sword of a god. Her past, unveiled; her present, aflame.

Her ledger, dripping red.

"Natasha," Fury says, above the helicopter's roar.

She turns her voice to steel. "What?"

"Are you all right?"

And she shouldn't answer, but this is Nick Fury — this is _Nick _and he is _alive _— and she doesn't want to lie to him. What would be the point? Her layers of deception have been scraped away; she feels like a beating heart, like a single exposed nerve, like an intricate web of shatterpoints. The world has seen her as she really is. She has nothing left to hide behind.

Truthfully, in a low whisper, she says, "I've been compromised."

Fury doesn't reply. He stares straight ahead, his attention focused on piloting. He grants her the privilege of personal space.

To the contrary, Sam Wilson looks at her with contemptible pity. "You're a soldier," he says. "I understand. It takes time... to find your way back."

"I'm a spy, not a soldier," Natasha says. "I serve a directive, not a flag."

Sam opens his mouth to reply when, from below them, there comes a horrible, horrible crash — a roar of crashing and collision. Fury curses. The roar rises to an almost unbearable crescendo, then dwindles down into utter silence. As an icy fear slides down her spine, Natasha makes a mistake. She looks down.

She looks down, and time stands still.

The helicarriers obliterated each other, which means that Steve undeniably completed his mission. But he never commed to confirm his location, and the final helicarrier – the sight of his last stand – is submerged in the Potomac.

(And if he was on board, if he didn't get out, if he was shot or stabbed or _killed –_)

Natasha's chest clamps. "Agent Hill," she says, tapping the comm at her wrist. "Do you have a read on the Captain's location?"

A pause. Static. Dead, stale air. Then: "No. No, I don't."

"Comm him."

Maria hesitates. "I've lost the signal, Agent Romanoff."

Natasha chokes on nothing at all, nothing but the pressure that's building in her lungs, closing up her throat. "Then find him," she says.

Maria takes a breath. "Natasha..."

"He fought his closest friend," she says.

"I know."

"He sacrificed everything."

"I know."

Something wedges between Natasha's ribs, a swift, sharp lurch in her gut, like an invisible knife sliding in. "Then find him, damn it!"

Seconds pass. Sam Wilson looks at her, his grief unmasked. Fury takes a slow, deep breath. The unspoken truth bears down on them, inescapable.

"Natasha." Maria Hill's voice is barely a whisper. "I'm sorry."

**~x~X~x~**

She comms him for the third time — "Captain, what's your status?" — and she grips the comm at her wrist with her other hand, as if by force she could elicit a reply.

Silence answers, absolute.

Fury's knuckles are white around the copter's controls. "Romanoff —"

"Say something, Rogers," she says through her teeth, but the only sound is the whirring of helicopter blades. Her heart pounds. "Say something, damn it."

Silence.

A little louder, Fury says, "Romanoff."

The comm hisses with static. Something inside of Natasha gives way, some long-forgotten fracture that's splitting again. "Steve," she says, choking. "Talk to me, Steve." Her breath hitches. "Steve. _Steve_."

"Natasha," Fury says, forcefully. "You have to stop."

All at once, this moment is irrevocably real. She jams her fist against her gritted teeth, fighting to keep back her answering scream, but it tears loose anyway. It is an unnatural sound; it breaks her apart; it opens up inside her chest and presses up against her ribs, and it grows and _grows_ and it's never going to stop. She's screaming into a closed mouth, screaming into nothing.

It sounds like she's shattering.

Maybe she is.

**~x~X~x~**

They tell her to stay faraway from the wreckage. They tell her that a S.H.I.E.L.D. rescue team will delve into the Potomac — but S.H.I.E.L.D. is splintered, its agents scattered and disorganized. When she asks exactly who is in this rescue team, and when they'll start, and what exactly their plan might be, she is swiftly silenced.

Only then does Natasha understand that the rescue is a farce, a desperate grasp at a fading dream. They don't expect to find Steve Rogers alive.

They don't expect to find Steve Rogers at all.

"I could come with them," Natasha says, hating the tremor in her voice. "I've been an assassin. I know how to track a missing man."

"Your cover is blown, Romanoff. You may have lost friends, and you'll certainly have made enemies. Now is not the time for you to be out in the open." Maria Hill manages a weary smile. She says, "We'll tell you if we find him."

Natasha bridles at the casual _if_. As though Steve Rogers could simply vanish. As though the river could erase even his legacy.

As Agent Hill turns on her heel, Natasha tethers her feet to the floor. She stands silent, her expression schooled into neutrality. Her pulse pounds. She listens to Hill's footsteps until they collapse back into silence.

Behind her, Nick Fury says, "What are you thinking, Romanoff?"

There is something in his voice – a raggedness, a wearing thin, a well-masked vulnerability. Suddenly, he is not Director Fury; he is only Nick.

Natasha swallows. She remembers how he gripped her shoulder after the Battle of New York, as if to say, _I'm still here. _She remembers the first time they spoke of her darker days; how she whispered of all she'd lost (and taken away), and how he simply answered,_I've lost an eye, Romanoff... but I keep my good one on the future, not the past._

Then she remembers his body — the body she believed to be dead — stretched out on the medical table.

She remembers trusting him, but the world is different now. (Or perhaps the world has always been this way.)

Natasha grips her pistol. "I'm going to the crash site," she says, starting to walk.

"Agent Hill said —"

"I know what Hill said."

He speaks her name, softly; not an order, but a plea. "Natasha."

But she doesn't turn to look at him, doesn't even break her stride. "Don't follow me," she says over her shoulder.

**~x~X~x~**

Somewhere, Maria Hill is organizing a rescue team.

On the banks of the Potomac, Natasha Romanoff is already there.

There's a terrifying moment when she doesn't see anything but sand upon sand, and the dark abyss of river-water, and the smoke-stained sky. She looks down at the sunken monolith of the helicarrier, and every part of her constricts to block another scream.

Then, on the wind, she hears, "...Tasha."

And then she's running — her heartbeat alive in her throat and in her fingertips — running and running and Steve is _right there_. All of her panic retreats in a rush.

She drops to the sand, kneeling beside him. "Damn you, Rogers."

He raises his eyebrows. "You should be thanking me."

"For what?"

"Surviving."

Somehow she laughs, though her throat is raw from screaming. "What makes you think I care?"

Weakly, his mouth lifts into a smile. His eyes are blue and fierce, like summer skies. "You're a terrible liar."

"Am I?" she breathes.

"To me," he says.

Everything rises up at once, a cleansing, searing tide that wipes her clean.

The absurd glint in his eyes, every time she looked at him during the Avengers Initiative.

The foolish fact that she found herself smiling whenever he laughed, and whenever he missed a pop culture reference, and whenever he questioned her judgment (because who really decides to hijack a Chitauri sky-sled, after all?)

The night in Chicago, when his heartbeat lulled her to sleep.

The moment she awoke from surgery, and his_ best friend_ had tried to kill her,but his primary concern was _if she was okay._

The effortless way that he moved to guard her, during the Battle of New York — how the fireballs came swirling over and around them, but his shield stood firm — how he held her tight against him, and she saw the blush he tried to hide — and how he did the same in the bunker in New Jersey, how he doesn't even have to think about protecting her because it's _just_ _what he does._

It has been so long since Natasha was certain of anything, but this — this _thing_ between them — it is aggressive and persistent, and the thought of losing him now, after all they've been through, after all they've fought for, was enough to buckle her knees.

On impulse, Natasha grips his face between her hands and kisses him, slow and sure. His lips move in time with hers, and his fingers find their way into her hair, pulling her closer. She can't remember how to breathe.

Steve Rogers doesn't need her, and she sure as hell doesn't need him. But she _wants him, _not because of an assignment from S.H.I.E.L.D. but because, when she's with him, sometimes for the briefest moment she believes this could be home.

Abruptly, he cries out in pain.

Natasha draws back, her lips hovering inches from his. "Steve, I'm sorry. I'm sorry, I..." She looks down. Bloodstains bloom across his chest, staining his uniform a dark, dark red. She pulls back, her face white. "Oh, hell, did you get shot?"

Steve shrugs, wincing. "Once or twice."

"I'll comm a medical team," she says, her adrenaline pumping. _Damn, that's a lot of blood. _Some of the desperation must show in her voice, because Maria Hill doesn't ask questions. She simply agrees to come, then disconnects immediately.

"You're going to be okay, Steve," Natasha says. "I swear, you're going to be okay."

"Are you?"

"What?"

He holds her gaze, piercing. "Are you okay?"

At the question, heat flushes her face, burns through her veins. He watches her, unassuming. Willing to wait for her to gather her courage.

After a breath, she says, "I followed our plan."

Steve pauses, processing. A crease forms between his eyebrows, then vanishes as he remembers. "Your cover's blown," he says, and it isn't a question.

Natasha swallows. She's on the verge of something — a sob or a gasp or another scream — but she's repressed it all for so long, she can't even tell the difference. She wants to talk, but all she can do is nod.

Silence settles. There is only the river and their unsteady breaths.

"I don't have to see it," Steve says.

"See what?"

"Your history," he says.

She blinks, overcome. "Steve..."

"I don't have to see it," he says, not a sliver of deceit in his eyes. His smile is sunlight, chasing her shadows away. "I don't have to see any of it."

They stare at each other, barely blinking.

Softly, Natasha asks, "Why?"

He grips her hand, knotting their fingers together. "I trust you," he says. "To talk to me."

A single tear falls, slipping down her cheek. "Steve," she says. "Steve, you can't... I'm not..." _Not who you think I am. Not the woman I'd like to be._

But he tightens his grip on her hand and says, "I trust you."

Without thinking, she leans down to kiss him again. He is inexperienced, allowing her to take the lead. And she does. He tastes like fire and steel and ash, like a thousand fractured yesterdays. She kisses him harder, long and deep, desperate and damaged, like a promise of tomorrow.

It's the fourth time they touch, and it should be the end, but it feels like a beginning.

When they break apart, they're both panting.

"Natasha," he says against her lips.

And she decides that, if Steve Rogers can allow her to keep secrets, there is still one secret he deserves to know.

"That isn't my real name," she says, trembling. For so long, she has been Natasha Romanoff; for so long, she has been the Black Widow. But maybe, for just one moment, she can be as she once was. "It's Natalia."

"Natalia," Steve says.

Damn, she loves the way he says her name. She adds, "Romanova."

"Natalia Romanova," he says, and then he smiles. "I like it."

"You'd better."

Together, they rest on the riverbank. Occasionally, Steve says, "Natalia," like it's a secret (even though the whole world now knows,) and she tells him to be quiet and save his strength. By the third time, her name is a gasp of pain — _Na–ta–lia _— and she reaches out for his hand, and he grips her wrist tightly, his thumb pressed against her racing pulse. And they stay that way until Agent Hill and the medical team arrive.

As they lift him on to a stretcher, as they inject a needle into his arm, as his eyes glaze and his head lolls, Steve murmurs, "I love you, Natalia."

And Natasha doesn't know what she would have said, because he falls asleep before she can reply.

**~x~X~x~**

**A/N: First, the songs for this chapter: 1. Shattered (MTT Version) – Trading Yesterday 2. Unintended – Muse**

Second, a few little what-I-was-thinking-while-I-wrote-this tidbits.

All references to the Red Room and Natasha's real name (Natalia Romanova) are drawn from the comics. I might be new to this, but I do my research. Hopefully, this is somewhat accurate to the Black Widow's history as a character.

You might have noticed the repetition of a particular phrase in Natasha's memories of Red Room training: "More speed, more power." That's sort of an inside joke... with myself. I used to take Tae Kwon Do, before I realized my complete and total lack of athletic ability, and my (very scary) teacher would say "more speed, more power" _constantly. _I'm fairly certain that the mantra is engraved into my skull. At least now I've put it to good use here!

I came very close to actually crying while I was writing Natasha's attempts to comm Steve. I was listening to the aforementioned "Shattered" song, and I suddenly thought of Peggy's radio conversation with Steve before he was frozen in the ice, and everything sort of bled together... I almost never cry, so that was weird. If I captured what I was feeling in the written scene, even a little bit, I'll count this chapter a success.

Hopefully, I've managed to keep the more intimate moments between these two realistic. Confession time: I've never kissed anyone. As Steve Rogers might say, I'm waiting for the right partner. So, for those of you who are a little older than I am, are those moments in the fic realistic? Any advice on improvement?

Well, that's all for now. Keep an eye out for **the last installment **and **contest details. **Thank you again for reading – if you have time, please do review. Feedback is a beautiful thing.


	5. AN: Art Contest, Deploy!

**This chapter is an Author's Note; the story will resume (and conclude) in the fifth installment, which will be posted as chapter six. If you have any artistic ability (or Photoshop skills,) you will want to read this chapter regardless.**

Thanks to **Emmelyn Cindy Mah**for unwittingly providing the title for this chapter. (I actually have a character in my plotline notes somewhere – she's for another story that I don't post online – whose name is Emalyn. But she dies, so that's a key difference between you two, ha ha.)

**So, what's all this about an art contest? **Well, here's the deal: I am absolutely, hopelessly, abysmally unable to draw with any degree of skill. Even my stick people are out of proportion. I also don't have Photoshop (and have zero photoshop skills, anyway.) The result of all this is that all I have for fanfic covers is movie screenshots or someone else's art. **Which is where you come in.**

**Beginning with the post of this chapter, I'm officially opening a cover art contest for ****be my shield (five times we touched)****. With any luck, I'll actually get some entries. *crosses fingers***

**_The technical details_****_:_**

**1:** According to the image guidelines on fanfic, "For the best image quality and to avoid distortions you must **submit images with a 6/9 width to height ratio with dimensions of 300(W)x450(H) or larger. Do not submit square images** as they will be cropped." Keep size in mind as you design your contest entry; **if I have to resize it too much for upload, it will be warped as cover art and therefore unusable.**

**2:** Any use of adult/provocative images will **result in immediate disqualification** from the contest.

**3:** Supported image file formats are .jpeg, .jpg, .gif, .png, .bmp, .tiff.

**4: **I will choose one piece of cover art for use on both **my fanfic account** (under Shadows of a Dream) and **my Figment account** (under Laura Genn.)

**5: You can enter as many times as you like, in whatever formats you like **(see _the artsy details_.)

**6: Post your finished contest entries on any upload website (i.e. Photobucket, DeviantArt, etc.) with a link to ****be my shield (five times we touched)****, specifying that your art is for a contest.**

**7: To enter on fanfic, send me a private message with the subject line ART CONTEST, in which you** **explain where I need to go in order to access your contest entry**. Fanfic doesn't allow you to send links in PMs, so you'll have to direct me to the appropriate location (i.e. "my username on DeviantArt is X, I titled the entry Y.") **To enter on Figment, leave a comment on my profile with a link to your contest entry, specifying what it is.**

**8: The deadline for contest entries is 12:00 AM, EST, on June 18th.** If that seems like a weird date, that's because it is; June 18th my birthday, so I thought it would be fun to post the winning art piece then.

**_The artsy details:_**

**1: Any and all mediums of artwork are permitted,** whether drawn by hand or designed with Paint or constructed with some fancy art program that I've never heard of. If you have art skills of any kind, go for it.

**2: **Photoshop is also permitted as a possible method, in order to use movie screenshots, comic pictures, text, etcetera to design the cover art. **Nevertheless, any and all pictures which are used in photoshop must have been legally released. **Any screenshots of "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" which were captured from a torrent or any other illegal means will **result in immediate disqualification. **The same goes for basically any image that you don't own and was not freely released by Marvel and/or its affiliates. **I don't steal content, and I won't tolerate you doing it, either. **Respect the people who pour their time and effort into making these films!

**3: Be creative with this – there are countless options.** You could illustrate a scene from "The Winter Soldier" or this fanfic. You could draw a completely original Captasha picture. You could use Photoshop to create a miraculous, Photoshoppy thing (can you tell I don't know how to work the program? *sigh*) **As I already stated, you can enter as many pieces as you want.**

Well, that's all for contest details. If any of you actually enter this, expect that I will be flailing and virtually hugging you. :D

I'm going to be very busy for the next few weeks (I have a national Lincoln-Douglas debate tournament at the end of the month,) but rest assured, Chapter 5 will be posted as soon as possible. Thanks again for reading!


	6. Little Talks (Somebody To Die For) PART1

There are EMTs waiting when the helicopter lands. Natasha infers that the destruction of the Triskelion has already made it to national news — and even if S.H.I.E.L.D. has been compromised, America isn't about to let its most prized symbol of freedom die from bullet wounds. No one requests details or even asks for identification; they simply roll Steve's stretcher through the hospital and into the surgical wing.

Absently, Natasha imagines if their roles had been reversed. Would the government have tried to save her? Or would they have considered her blood to be atonement for her crimes, and simply sent a nurse to hold her hand until death came?

Steve's surgery takes time. The minutes fade into one another, like watercolors in the rain, as Natasha paces the hospital. Occasionally, she hears doctors in whispered conversation as she passes. One young nurse's eyes meet hers, then flash with recognition before she quickly looks away.

Natasha swallows hard. It will take time, adjusting to this new life — where everyone knows the long, long list of her sins; where the red on her ledger is not only permanent, but public.

It feels as though Steve's treatment must undoubtedly be concluded, but somehow, the doctors are still at work on his vast array of wounds. Eventually, after making several laps around the hospital's halls, Natasha sinks down upon a chair in the waiting room. The reversal of polarity occurs to her — how only a short while ago, the winter ghost had shot _her_, and it was Steve who was awaiting word on her condition.

_What did he do while he waited? _she wonders. He's probably a praying man. At the thought of Steve Rogers, pleading with God to spare her life, her breath hitches. She wishes she could offer the same support, but she's fairly certain that lifting hands to heaven is worthless when those hands are scarlet-stained. She'd probably have better luck bargaining with the devil.

Then again, she might not have any virtue left to trade.

The waiting room is quiet, ideal for resting. Natasha is keenly aware of why the medical personnel have kept their distance (_you lie and kill, in the service of liars and killers,_) but she's too relieved by the respite to protest. Taking a breath, she closes her eyes. Maybe she sleeps, or maybe she only drifts, but it's difficult to tell. If she does sleep, it's blessedly dreamless.

At some point, she's startled by a hand on her shoulder.

Natasha looks up, heart hammering; but at the sight of her friend, the fighting instinct flees from her bones. "Nick," she says.

"The one and only."

They look at each other, neither one daring to voice the tension between them. Only days ago, she watched him die, then tried to all but drown herself in vodka. And how here he is, alive. It is a jarring transition, from the black-and-white of tear-stained memories to the blinding color of continued reality.

Nick Fury is alive. Has never been dead in the first place. Natasha should be grateful, but she's angry.

He grips her shoulder, a silent assurance, and says, "Rogers is going to be fine."

"I know," she replies, and that knowledge is comforting. But her throat still tightens at his looks at him, and her blood runs cold. "You died," she says.

"So I did," he says.

She blinks hard, choking back her questions. "I lost you," she says.

A muscle twitches in Nick Fury's jaw. In a voice tied to a rock, he says, "I did what I had to do."

More than anyone, Natasha understands having to choose between two terrible options. He had no choice; he could either die solely in name, or also face death in body._I forgive you, _she wants to say_. I can forget. I can move forward. _But the words refuse to come.

"Was Steve glad?" Nick asks, a serious note in his voice. "That you were the one to find him?"

Natasha nods, stiffly. "Yes," she says.

The quiet between them is unbearable, but she doesn't know how to shatter it.

Then Nick says, "I've seen the way you look at him, when you think nobody's watching," and it's so unexpected that words die completely on her tongue.

Natasha bites her lip. "I don't —"

"You can lie to as many people as you like, Romanoff," Nick says. "Even yourself." He takes a seat beside her, unassuming. "But you can never lie to me."

She can lie to whoever she damn well pleases, but she doesn't _want _to lie to him, and trying to balance obligations with want makes everything so much more more complicated. Natasha averts her gaze. Nick waits, trusting her to reply.

Natasha's chest constricts. Since Russia — since the life she would rather forget — this man is the closest thing she has had to a father.

"In a different world... If I wasn't the Black Widow, if he wasn't the super-soldier —"

"He started out as a skinny kid from Brooklyn."

Abject, Natasha stares at the wall. "He started out _whole._"

There is a beat of silence — like the instant after impact, right before glass shatters. Nick waits for her to meet his eyes before he speaks.

"You love him," he says, like it's self-evident. Even though everything is going to hell.

Natasha shakes her head. "Love is for children."

"Tell that to Chicago." At that, she glares at him, but Nick simply leans back, shrugging his shoulders. "Yes," he says. "I arranged that rooming situation on purpose."

For once, Natasha is caught off guard. "Why?" she asks.

"I like to see you smile," Nick says. "Lately, it seems like you have a personal objection to it."

Natasha closes her eyes. In a different world, she might have poured out her heart to Steven Rogers — might have entrusted him with her secrets and scars — might have dared to bare her every bloodstain before his earnest gaze — but this is not a different world by any stretch of the imagination, and any she hope she had of building one died the moment she released her ledger to the world. The past is an indelible stain upon her present.

Natalia Romanova might have had a chance, but Natasha Romanoff does not have space in her life for love.

"Why Steve?" she says, because she can't help but ask. "Of all the agents you could have assigned to me, of all the agents in S.H.I.E.L.D., why Steve?"

Nick crosses his arms. "He spends almost seventy years as a human Popsicle," he says. "He wakes up, and his girlfriend is in a nursing home. He's a symbol of another time. The war is over, but it never really stopped. And there are aliens in New York."

She bites her lip. "So you did this for him."

"I did this for both of you," Nick says. "To give you a second chance."

"At what?" Natasha asks, because fallen angels do not get second chances.

"At who you want to be." The hope on his face unravels her.

She straightens, shoulders tense. "I made my own choices, Nick. Wrong choices. Choices that hurt the people I..." Her eyes dart away; her voice drops an octave. "I've seen a lot of things," she says. "I've wasted all my second chances."

"Maybe," Nick says. "Maybe not."

_Maybe_. The word flutters in her chest like a trapped bird, filling her with a longing that has no name. It flits about her head for hours.

_Maybe_, when the doctors say that Steve will recover. _Maybe_, when the first thing he says to her is, "Natalia," and he hugs her so hard that she fears he'll crack her ribs. _Maybe_, when she does the childish thing and kisses him on the cheek (soft and sweet, like a promise or a goodbye.)

Later on, as she's leaving the cemetery (and it really feels like she buried a dream,) Natasha begins to find breathing difficult. It's an absurd reaction (hasn't she left for missions before?), so she waits for the struggle to subside; but after twenty minutes of driving, she has to pull over and steady herself.

Knuckles white, Natasha grips the steering wheel.

_What the hell is wrong with me?_

On the (_empty_) passenger side seat, her phone vibrates. Hesitant, she switches the screen to life. There's a text hovering over the main menu.

_FURY, NICKOLAS J.: You can't run away from everything._

Natasha shifts the car into drive, slamming on the gas pedal. A few seconds later, on the side of the road, ex-Director Fury's phone receives a text.

_ROMANOFF, NATASHA: But I can try._

**~x~X~x~**

**A/N: **Thanks to all of my lovely reviewers, I've been inspired to expand the last segment of Steve and Natasha's story into more than one chapter. **This is not the end!**Before Steve and Nat can reunite, they have personal demons to face while they are apart. I could easily write about that period of time for a small forever, but I'm trying to work on a novel of my own, so I need to complete this story eventually in order to return to my primary pursuit. **There will probably be two more installments, possibly three. **The final chapters will be a bit of a slow burn; I intend to build up to a climactic conclusion, fleshing out the aftermath of WINTER SOLDIER on multiple fronts.

For one thing, Bucky will make an appearance — my characterization of him will be heavily inspired by **Lauralot's fanfic, ****AND I AM ALWAYS WITH YOU**, which is breaking my heart into a million pieces in the best way. I intend to acknowledge one key element of the comics: that Bucky and Natasha knew each other during her training in the Red Room, and that they were lovers at least briefly. As much as I love Captasha, the fact remains that Natasha has history before him. Bucky will be a critical part of that history in the coming chapters.

Second, my next update will address Steve and Peggy's present states, given their complicated past together. I've had this one scene eating at my brain for at least a week now; I need an outlet for my damaged Steve/Peggy feels. (This fic is starting to turn into an enormous bundle of shipping emotions.)

Third and finally, I intend to (at least briefly) grapple with what exactly happens to Natasha _personally _after the film – having her covers blown presumably puts her on the radar of old enemies.

Please forgive me for not listing the reviewers in this chapter. I love all of you, but it's past one o'clock in the morning... it's a testament to my stubbornness that I managed to finish this tonight at all (or this morning, now, I suppose.) **The fact that this is not the last chapter of ****be my shield****is****largely due to your incredible response to my story. Thank you, truly. I love all of you.**

**Songs for this chapter (and the coming installments!): 1. Little Talks (Of Monsters and Men) 2. Somebody to Die For (Hurts)**


	7. Little Talks (Somebody To Die For) PART2

Three days after Natasha vanishes, Steve Rogers receives a phone call. The caller ID says "unknown number," and his fingertips feel numb as he answers. He holds his breath. "Natalia?"

"Steve? It's Sharon," says a voice (_the wrong voice_,) and a knot tightens between Steve's ribs. "Who's Natalia?"

"You didn't read Natasha's files?"

"You did?"

Steve's fingers tense around the cell phone. "No," he says. "No, I didn't."

Silence opens a fissure between them. Steve considers hanging up, but then he remembers Nick Fury's lesson in twenty-first century phone etiquette.

Before the Battle of New York, Fury left voicemail after voicemail on Steve's cell phone, not realizing that Steve had no idea how to check his messages. (_Contrary to what Stark Industries may have told you, this is not an invite to a super-secret boy band... I realize that the Internet is incredibly distracting, but the world at large is in danger, and I need you to return my calls... I'm sorry about the forties room of deceit, now please get off your ass and contact me... Please tell me you're not trapped in a freezer or something..._) After approximately his eleventh attempt, Fury resorted to making a personal visit: the visit that ultimately brought Steve to the Avengers.

The Initiative was activated, the Battle of New York commenced, and so on and so forth. After the chaos concluded, Fury took it upon himself to teach Steve the rules of phone communication before releasing him back into the "real world," seeing as all of the Avengers would undoubtedly be dogged by reporters for weeks.

Steve remembers that there are two options for dealing with unwanted conversation. Don't answer the phone, or say very little until the other person becomes uncomfortable.

Right now, Steve tries the latter. He falls silent, and he waits.

"She trusted you a lot," Sharon says. "Natasha, I mean. I could tell."

At that, Steve's face burns. "She did," he says.

There is a prolonged silence, during which Steve wonders why Sharon would call so suddenly. Then he remembers Natasha's parting advice (call that nurse,) and his heart races.

Any rational man would count himself blessed to spend an afternoon with a woman like Sharon — she is beautiful, tactful, friendly, and endearing. She makes small talk without effort, and she laughs often, even when all seems lost. But something in Steve has grown fond of rough edges and sarcasm, of quick replies amidst rattling bullets, of uneasy silence and everything it says. Steve doesn't want the girl who smiles easily; he wants a smile that he has to earn.

He isn't sure what that says about him.

Still, the line is quiet. Steve's heart presses against his ribs. Eventually, after what feels like a forever, Sharon speaks. She doesn't want to go out for coffee (which inexplicably lessens the pressure in Steve's chest.) Rather, she wants to be real with him after having been undercover for so long.

"I'm Peggy's niece," she says, as though the words don't make Steve's whole body clench like a fist. "I thought you should know. I'm sorry I couldn't tell you, but —"

"It's all right," Steve says, even though it isn't. Even though his ears are ringing with _Saturday night at the Stork Club, _and_ don't you dare be late_. "I understand."

Sharon takes a breath. "Someday, I hope you can forgive me," she says.

And Steve should say, I already have, but all he can manage is an echo. "Someday."

At length, Sharon says, "Goodbye, Steve. Take care of yourself."

"I will," he says.

Then he opens drawer to retrieve a folder labeled PEGGY CARTER — a file he demanded from Fury, as a condition of his joining the Avengers. He flips through pages of black-and-white photographs. Peggy, receiving a medal of valor. Peggy, effortlessly beautiful, in the arms of her husband. Peggy, admitted to a nursing home for a slow onset of dementia.

Sharon.

Sharon _Carter_.

Peggy was — _is_ — an aunt. And he missed that moment. He missed every moment, missed seventy years of impossibly priceless moments, and he can cut off every one of HYDRA's heads, but he will never be able to turn back time. Steve puts the folder back into the drawer.

And then he cries.

**~x~X~x~**

Two weeks after Natasha's departure, Steve gathers his courage and goes to the nursing home.

A lesser man might have seen a mere ghost of the woman he loved; but when old, old Peggy Carter looks at him, her brown eyes bright, Steve swears it's 1940, and they're in a cab in Brooklyn, and he's daring to hope that the right partner (for so much more than a dance) is sitting right beside him, smiling as she glances away.

Then she speaks — a rattling, faltering sound — and she is only an elderly woman.

"Steve," Peggy says, sitting up in bed. "You came."

Steve blinks. "How did you know I was —"

"But you're late." Peggy gestures to the analog clock on the wall. "I told you eight o'clock. For our dance."

For a moment, Steve thinks she's teasing — but then he looks into her eyes again, and their light is glassy and faraway. _Dementia._ His chest collapses in on itself. _Does she really believe... that it's still 1940?_

"I'm sorry," Steve says. "It was an accident."

Peggy weaves her fingers together, as if in prayer. Her hands are wrinkled now, a web of blue veins spidering beneath thin, pale skin. "Sit with me, Steve," she says. "Tell me again how you won the war."

They sit together for over an hour, Steve doing most of the talking. Peggy closes her eyes, listening, and sometimes she flashes a smile that pierces his heart, or she laughs lightly as though they're simply a boy and a girl — two bold youths in the thick of a battle, afraid but unflinching, daring to dream of something more.

As the sun slips below the horizon, Peggy says, "Visit me again, Steve."

And as he slips out the door, Steve says, "Anything for my best girl."

**~x~X~x~**

Their meetings become a regular affair. Like twin clock hands, they meet at intervals for the briefest time before cycling away again (but only until the following week.)

They talk about the war, about the super-soldier serum, about Steve's home in Brooklyn, about how brave Bucky was, about the Red Skull's demise. Steve doesn't have the heart to tell her that Bucky is a broken-hearted boy who's still alive (but not really,) or that HYDRA actually did grow new heads after its pseudo-death, or that being a soldier is far more complicated than he ever imagined. So they talk about what was, not what is — and certainly not about what will be.

Because they haven't the slightest idea.

Every week, as Steve enters her room, Peggy says, "You're late, Steve. I told you eight o'clock at the Stork Club." And every week, Steve says he's sorry, and he holds her tight, and sometimes tears leak out of her eyes and drip down his T-shirt, but truth be told, he doesn't mind.

When Steve holds her, he somehow feels... _whole_.

For a little while.

**~x~X~x~**

One night, Steve decides to surprise her.

It's the day before he usually visits, and he arrives at eight o'clock on the dot, wearing his best suit and a new tie. And he tells her they'll go dancing. She asks that they visit the Stork Club, but the nurses won't allow her to leave (and the Stork Club closed down sixty years ago,) so he tells her they'll dance where they are, and he'll have the band play something slow.

He brings an old record player, and a record he found at a pawn shop, and he plays Perry Como's "Till the End of Time."

_Till the end of time, long as stars are in the blue_

_Long as there's a Spring of birds to sing, I'll go on loving you_

_Till the end of time, long as roses bloom in May_

_My love for you will grow deeper with every passing day _

She grips his shoulder with a frail, trembling hand, and he guides her through the steps. In all honesty, he's been practicing at home. Somehow, he doesn't step on her toes.

Somehow, it is the 1940s again.

_Till the wells run dry and each mountain disappears_

_I'll be there for you to care for you through laughter and through tears_

_So take my heart in sweet surrender and tenderly say that I'm_

_The one you love and live for till the end of time_

They move in perfect tandem, like silhouettes, like slowly fading reflections of all that could have been.

**~x~X~x~**

**A/N: **I'm sorry if this feels rushed, but I'm finishing it at literally the last possible minute. I'm leaving for Lincoln-Douglas debate nationals in Chicago RIGHT NOW, so I can't update this weekend or write a decent author's note. I love all of you, I swear, but can't reply to reviews right now. Thank you again. You're all fantastic.


	8. Little Talks (Somebody To Die For) PART3

**A/N:** I've given up on listing my reviewers from fanfic because there are just too many of them! But I will say: Thank you, all of you. You truly make writing this story that much more worth it.

Naturally, this might take more updates than I planned, seeing as I've been busy out of my mind. School will end this coming Monday, though, so hopefully I'll have this story finished quite soon!

On to the next installment.

**~x~X~x~**

The nightmares are haunting again.

Few and far between are the nights that Natasha wakes gently; after the sun falls away, after darkness has crept in, it's only a matter of time before her sleep is disturbed by the shadow and the blood. She wakes in an icy sweat, every muscle seized with shaking, every breath a reminder that she is still alive, and she is still alone.

Once, when the night terror comes, what she screams is not a wordless plea, but a name — _Steve, Steve, Steve_ — and when she comes awake like a drowning girl, all raw gasps and heavy limbs, she doesn't know if she's trembling from the dream or from the resurgent reality.

The window is open. The wind hisses, _Natalia, Natalia,_ and Black Widow slams it shut, and she doesn't sleep again until sunrise.

And when she does sleep, she's screaming again.

**~x~X~x~**

Dream or nightmare, it unravels him.

For the first time, Steve Rogers has dreams not of Bucky Barnes, his friend twice lost, but of Peggy Carter, young and beautiful. He and she dance together to the same song, over and over, again and again — until he asks her a question, and she doesn't answer, and when he looks closer he finds that he's dancing with a skeleton. The skeleton, gleaming white, smiles up at him. The sharp edges of finger-bones prick the skin of his arms. And when he wakes, he can't breathe.

The dream never fails to startle Steve, though it is always the same; until once when, upon seeing the bones, he fails to wake. Instead, his dream-self stares and stares until new flesh clothes the skeleton, and suddenly he is holding a woman again — but a woman of dark eyes, and scarlet hair, and lean arms that guide him through the steps.

When Steve wakes, his heart is pounding. He has the most absurd sensation, as though the space beside him on the bed should not be empty. The air feels cold and stale.

And then his cell phone rings, and the caller ID says _Sharon Carter_, and there's only one reason that Sharon would call at three AM.

Steve answers with a trembling hand. "Sharon?"

Silence. A choked breath; a muffled sob.

"She's gone, Steve. Peggy's gone."

**~x~X~x~**

Natasha has a strategy for dealing with her sorrows. If possible, she knows how to kill an unruly enemy; she also knows how to vanish, throwing phantoms off her trail. But with her records now public and S.H.I.E.L.D. reduced to rubble, only one option is readily available.

Natasha drowns her sorrows in alcohol. Even so, she has no desire to repeat the incident after Nick Fury's pseudo-death. She recalls very little of it, save for blurry details — spilling vodka on her kitchen table, falling when she tried to sit down, her fingernails buried in Steve's T-shirt (and she doesn't want to know the context of that moment) — but she recalls enough to know that she ought to be more careful.

Going to the bar after revealing her many identities to the world is a startling experience. She's had to repel unwanted advances from strange men on more than one occasion — but now, people disperse when she sits down. Even the bartender shoots sidelong glances at another employee when she asks for a glass of wine. True to her streak of bad luck, the television behind her is airing coverage of her speech on Capitol Hill, and she can almost hear her own racing heartbeat as those around her connect the silent, serious woman before them with the bold ex-assassin on the news.

These know who she truly is; that person frightens them. Of this, she's as proud as she is ashamed.

Natasha drinks her wine slowly, trying to make it last. More than one drink could lead to a repeat of the vodka incident, so it seems better to err on the side of caution. She listens to the bar's music with eyes half-shut, willing her troubles to withdraw (if only for a night.)

When, at long last, she rises to leave (though she hasn't the slightest idea where she's going,) she's more than a little surprised to feel a hand on her arm. The grip is firm, unflinching. The touch of a man with singular purpose, but also surprising boldness.

Natasha turns to face the stranger, her voice like steel. "If you're looking for someone to warm your bed tonight, you've got the wrong —"

She barely has time to recognize the man's face before he presses the taser to her throat.

Natasha screams, or thinks she screams. Her world has become splintering light and surging heat and impact, her body crashing to the wooden floor with nothing to break her fall. Someone cries out and drops their drink, the glass shattering. There is a tangle of noise, a blurry rush of movement. She lays still, blinded by the shock.

When, after several long seconds, her vision clears, she sees that the bartender has dragged her attacker back, and another man has forced him to drop the taser.

The man stares at her, glazed eyes bulging. "That should have killed you!" His Russian accent is thick, even as he screams. "That shock should have killed you!"

Natasha gasps, her lungs burning. "Dreykov..."

"Are you even human?" he shouts, thrashing in the bartender's grip.

She wants to stand, wants to do anything but lie here like a prey animal, but her muscles won't work. "Dreykov, please..."

"I helped you, I hid you from the KGB, and this is how you repay me? This is how you settle your debts?"

Natasha's eyes burn. "Dreykov," she coughs, his name like a knife on her tongue. "I'm sorry."

"You killed my daughter."

Natasha chokes.

All at once, she's in the hospital in San Paulo, Brazil — she was only there for a flesh wound, that's all it was, and it was safe to visit a hospital now because S.H.I.E.L.D. had sealed her records — but it wasn't safe because _they_ found her (_the Soviet ghosts, the Russian phantoms, her handlers and her demons,_) and she didn't have time to think when the explosives went off, didn't have time to consider anything but _stay alive, stay alive, stay alive_ — and she really didn't hate anyone in that hospital, really did wake up screaming their names in her sleep, really wished she had gone back into the fire for them, but _they_ had found her, _they_ were coming, and they would kill her if she didn't run like hell — and when Clint asked her why she looked sleepless, she really did mean it when she said she was sorry, _is_ sorry.

For leaving them to die for her mistakes. For forgetting the debt she owed to Dreykov, her old friend.

For forgetting that Dreykov's daughter had been traveling the world, and had been stopped in San Paulo by a broken leg.

Another regret, another mistake. Another secret she kept from Steve, though she wonders if he saw it on her face when the bunker exploded in New Jersey (and suddenly she was in the hospital again, and she knew in her heart she would still run and not look back.)

Dreykov's daughter. San Paulo. The hospital fire. There was a time when, among Natasha's enemies, only Loki knew of this — her greatest shame.

That time is gone.

The bartender shocks Dreykov with his own taser. Then, inflectionless, he says, "You're not welcome here, Natasha Romanoff." And they leave her on the floor for a solid ten minutes while she waits for the paralysis to wear off. Maybe they're afraid to touch her; maybe they don't care whether she lives or dies.

It doesn't really matter.

No one says a word when Natasha exits the bar, unsteady on her feet. The electric shock should have killed her; even if the serum in her veins resisted, the negative effects still persist. Her vision reeling, her head spinning, she stumbles down a back alley, afraid of being followed by other ghosts of the past — not an unfounded fear, it would seem, for her heart goes cold when metal fingers close around her wrist.

"Natalia."

She knows that voice. (A deeply buried part of her longed to hear it.) He shouldn't be able to recall her true name, not after what HYDRA did to him, and yet, here he is.

Her chest clamps. "You read my records," she says.

"No." His breath is hot against her throat; it awakens memories she thought she had forgotten. "Natalia... Natalia, I remember."

She turns and looks at him: the long, unkempt hair, the rough beard, the firm jawline, and those eyes — _eyes she remembers _— dark and deep, but soft if you observed them in the light.

"James," she says, and then her legs give way.

There is a blunt shock as her head strikes the concrete. A lurch in her stomach as he lifts her into his mismatched arms.

And then darkness.

**~x~X~x~**

**A/N: **In "The Avengers," when Loki tells Natasha that Barton told him all about her past, he references three things: Dreykov's daughter, San Paulo, and the hospital fire. As far as I know, none of those events are from the comics, so I took the liberty of combining them. Something about Natasha's face when the bunker exploded in "Winter Soldier" spoke of more than fear of death, at least, to me; it looked like a flashback. My headcanon is that she was remembering said hospital fire.

Bucky and Natasha's relationship will be explored in the next chapter! In the meantime, if you need more Bucky Barnes in your life, I urge you to **read Lauralot's fanfic, "And I Am Always With You," **which has destroyed my heart in the most beautiful of ways. And no, she didn't ask me to recommend it. I'm doing that because I'm obsessed with it (and have left some embarrassingly fangirling reviews.)

In other news, my parents have bought me the most fantastic birthday present ever, since I turn 17 on June 18th: **I'm going to Philadelphia's Comic Con! **It's my first con, and Sebastian Stan & Anthony Mackie will be there, so it suffices to say that I'm beyond excited. Any advice you have on cons is welcome, so don't hesitate to PM me or add it to the end of your review. I have no idea what to expect, but I can hardly wait! I'm going on Saturday the 21st. There will be fangirl shrieking. (Sadly, Scarlett Johansson and Chris Evans won't be there... I want to meet them so badly, though!)

That's all for now. Please do review, if you don't mind – and thanks for reading!


	9. Little Talks (Somebody To Die For) PART4

**A/N: **Your reactions to the story (and also Comic Con advice) have been lovely. You are all fantastic. I've finally reached the chapter which addresses another of my secret ships, which sadly conflicts with Captasha: WinterWidow. I chose "Little Talks" by OF MONSTERS AND MEN for these final installments because I can't help but think of it as Bucky and Natasha's song, particularly due to the line, "All that's left is the ghost of you." Bucky is, as the WINTER SOLDIER film said, a ghost. The following installments will attempt to reconcile Natasha's past relationship with Bucky and my attempt at her present relationship with Steve.

**My portrayal of Bucky is heavily inspired by Lauralot's fanfic, "And I Am Always With You." **This was done with her permission.

**~x~X~x~**

Although this sleep was induced by electrocution, Natasha's nightmare still returns. This time, when the shadow unveils its (_her_) face, it also reveals a metal arm — and when she fires bullets into its (_her_) chest, the metal arm grips her throat and squeezes until she falls to her knees, gasping for air in a pool of its (_her_) blood, and suddenly she doesn't even know which one of them is dying.

Natasha wakes with a scream. She lurches upright only to collide with a metal arm, and for an instant the nightmare is irrevocably real, and she screams again as strong hands grip her shoulders and try to still her shaking. He's on his knees beside her; she's afraid to meet his eyes. She thrashes in his hold, but his fingers (_half machine, half man_) only tighten against her skin.

"Natalia. Natalia, it's me. It's me."

The softness in his voice cuts straight through her. "James," she tries to say, but her trembling lips cut off her voice.

"It's me," he says again, but his voice is inflectionless. His hands loosen on her shoulders. "It's me." And she wonders if he has any idea who that is, or if he's simply hoping that the words mean something to her.

They do.

They shouldn't.

Natasha breathes slowly, silently repeating simple truths to herself. _You are awake. You are alive. James is here. _She looks around, taking in the bare walls and cracked window. _You're in some sort of abandoned warehouse._

Not asleep. Not in danger.

Natasha runs a hand through her hair. "James," she says, and meets his eyes. "Oh, hell... I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"Are you... all right?"

"I am now."

A shadow passes over the Soldier's face. "That... man," he says, his eyebrows drawing together in the curious way that had so amused her when they were young. "He... hurt you. Why?"

"It's been a long time," Natasha says. "I've made mistakes."

"He hurt you."

"I hurt him, years ago."

The Soldier cracks his knuckles. Softly, he says, "Don't... know."

"What?"

"Can't..." He lifts the hand of flesh to his throat. "English. Don't speak."

Fresh horror slithers down Natasha's spine. "HYDRA conditioned you," she realizes. "To speak Russian."

He nods stiffly. "Sorry."

"Don't be."

"Want..." The hand at his throat tightens slightly, as if trying to evoke speech by force. Force is the only method he knows to elecit reward. "Want to talk."

He is like a little boy, searching out language for the first time, but his desperation speaks of a life lived too long. His eyes are glassy as he looks at her, brokenhearted. "Sorry," he says. He lowers his head. "Natalia."

Her throat closing up, she lays one palm over his hand of metal. "Don't you remember?" she says, using her native tongue. "I speak Russian. You can talk to me."

He smiles, then; a real smile, the kind that HYDRA could never smash out of him. In Russian, he asks, "You can understand me?"

"Yes."

"You speak Russian."

"Yes."

He reaches out with his hand of flesh, his fingertips brushing the curve of her cheekbone. "Natalia," he exhales, choking. "They took you away. They made me forget you. They _took you away _—"

She grips his wrist. "James."

"They took you away." He's tracing the arc of her cheek as if he could memorize it.

"I'm here," she says. "I'm here now."

"Stay."

"James..."

"_Stay_," he says, his voice hoarse from disuse. "Please."

Natasha lowers his hand, knotting her fingers with his. "You remember me," she says. "What about _you_? Do you remember who you are?"

His eyes shutter. Releasing her hand, he says, "HYDRA's secret weapon."

"No," she whispers.

"The Winter Soldier."

"No." She reaches for him, but he flinches away as if expecting a blow.

"I'm the Winter Soldier," he says, as if reading from a script. He grips his neck again, grasping for other words. But he only repeats himself. "I'm the Winter Soldier. I'm..." He trails off. "I'm..." And then nothing.

"Your name is James," Natasha says, her eyes stinging. His answering silence pierces her heart. "James Buchanan Barnes."

"Don't call me that."

"It's your name."

The Soldier stands, averting his gaze. "That man in the museum... I'm not him." His hand of metal tightens into a fist. "Maybe I was, but now I'm not."

Natasha sighs. Her chest feels hollow, her skin raw, every layer of protection scraped away. HYDRA was his salvation as much as S.H.I.E.L.D. was hers. Their respective shelters have burned, and now they sit like children in the rubble, sifting through the ashes for any small piece of who they might have been, or who they ought to be.

They are exactly alike in the worst possible way, and to see her own emptiness, her own unspoken fear, reflected back at her in the Soldier's eyes, is unnerving to the core. But it also slows her pulse; it also stills her trembling tongue.

Because she is not alone.

Natasha looks at him, eyebrows drawn together. "I suppose we're both blank slates now, aren't we?"

The Soldier doesn't answer, only stares at a battered wall.

"It's okay, James," she says, rising to her feet. "To be different than before. To be more than one person at the same time."

His shoulders tense. He looks at her, then; this time, his are not the eyes she remembers. They are twin extensions of expert programming, the visual processors of a machine.

"I know who I am, Natalia. I'm the Winter Soldier. I'm your teacher." A muscle feathers in his jaw; crimson flushes his cheeks, boyish. "Once, I remember... I was more than that."

Natasha opens her mouth, but her reply dies on her tongue. He remembers more than she expected; she's too stunned to react. He takes a step closer, and she's struck by how _tall _he is. Years dulled her memory of his sheer strength — the broad shoulders, the thick arms, the chiseled chest that she can see through his shirt.

His gaze is like touch. It makes her shiver.

Softly, he says, "We could be like that again."

Natasha swallows. Something rises up in her throat, a sudden sickness without explanation. There was a time when she loved him; that much is undeniable. But that time was followed by years of wearying absence, followed by her encounter with what she had once considered to be a ghost.

The Winter Soldier sent a bullet through her hip. The Winter Soldier tried to murder Nick Fury, the closest thing she has to a father. The Winter Soldier left Steve to bleed to death on the banks of the Potomac.

But James Buchanan Barnes used to run his hands along the curves of her body and whisper, _beautiful_, as he kissed her in the dark.

Natasha swallows. "Why did you come here?"

He hesitates; the pause, the sharp intake of breath, lasts only for an instant, but it is there. "I wanted to see you."

"I'm a liar by trade," Natasha says. "I know a half-truth when I hear it."

The Soldier looks into her eyes, his throat working but no sound coming out. At last, he says, "I could help you."

"Help me?"

"I could give you a mission again."

He has been conditioned to think in terms of targets and distractions. Want is a foreign concept, and might as well be another English word he cannot form; he has lived a half-life of missions and cryo-freeze and missions, and nothing else. He was once a man — but the crucible of time has forged him into a rifle.

Natasha could not bear to be a weapon again.

Arms crossed, she says, "I fight my own battles."

"You have nothing left to fight for," the Soldier says, and the truth of his words is all too acute.

Natasha digs her fingernails into her palms. "What are you proposing?"

There is a stretch of silence. The Soldier looks away from her, as if ashamed. He draws his shoulders back, locks his jaw in place. "There's a rogue branch of HYDRA," he says.

Natasha stares, disbelieving. Because he cannot have gone back. Because he cannot possibly be so broken that he would return to his handlers the moment he snapped their leash. Because James Buchanan Barnes used to kiss her in the dark.

"They want to fix things. They fixed my arm — they fixed my head, my memories." The Soldier smiles, apparently at a fond recollection. "They could help —"

"Why the hell would you go back?" Natasha snaps. The question tears loose without her permission. "Why? After what they did to you? After Steve —"

"Don't talk about him," the Soldier breathes, a wavering plea.

"He loves you."

"Don't _talk about him_," the Soldier snarls. His eyes are windows into the abyss within him; they hold only darkness.

Natasha nearly recoils. Softly, she asks, "Do you remember anything at all?"

The Soldier blinks. Then his mouth lifts into a small smile as he says, "I remember you."

For the first time, Natasha's relief at his return is replaced by a new, insidious fear. This man does not remember who he is, but he remembers who she was to him, remembers the kisses in the dark.

The Soldier expects her to want him, and she does. But not as she once did (though she can hardly pinpoint why.) Not as he surely wants her now, his eyes traveling from her head to her feet, his mouth still upturned in that lazy smile.

Natasha turns away, unable to bear it.

"I remember everything," the Soldier says. "All of it."

She doesn't look at him. "You put your faith in the wrong woman. I don't want any part of this."

Silence falls, the lethal knife that will finally sever them. Every part of her aching, Natasha begins to walk away.

Then the Soldier says, "Nat," in a trembling voice — his nickname for her, the name he breathed against her lips, the name he trailed along her skin in the dark — and her precarious calm falls apart.

Natasha freezes, her legs locked in place. Her hands are shaking.

"Nat," the Soldier says. "Please."

Against all logic, she turns her head, looks into his faraway eyes. "What?"

He steps suddenly closer, breathing hard, and says, "I've missed you." And she's still searching for a reply when he grabs her face with his hand of flesh and brings her mouth to his.

His kiss is firm, insistent, shameless — the way he used to kiss her in the dark — and her head spins with the rush of it, present and past blurring together. And then the hand of metal is on her face, too, and something lurches in her chest and she tries to pull away, but he's far too strong. He's insensible to her refusal, unaware of her resistance, lost in what they used to be. HYDRA has conditioned him to think in terms of masters and handlers, property and owners. He doesn't want to hurt her — but when she presses an open palm to his chest, he doesn't react, doesn't understand.

He tastes like darkness, like rust and salt and sugar, like secrets and regrets.

In an act of desperation, in an attempt to say, _stop_, Natasha digs her teeth into his lower lip.

But when James Buchanan Barnes kissed her in the dark, they kissed just as they sparred; eager and rough, a tangle of limbs and mouths. As her teeth break the Soldier's lip, Natasha sees the memories flash in his eyes, sees that her _stop _has been taken as a _yes_.

The Soldier's hand of metal grips her wrist, wrenching it back as he steps suddenly forward, and all at once, Natasha is pinned against the wall. His kiss is hard and edged with hunger, and this is how he touched her in the Red Room, and she's so completely stunned that for an instant, she finds herself kissing him back.

Then something registers — a strange, sharp sense that _this is not the man she wants to be kissing _— and without thinking, she brings her knee up into his groin.

The Soldier staggers back. He doubles over, panting.

Natasha stares at him, breathing hard. "You have no right to touch me," she says, trembling. "Don't you ever touch me."

The Soldier grunts; his lip is bleeding. "I'm sorry."

"You should be."

"What happened to you, Nat?"

Her pulse still racing, a cold sweat on the nape of her neck, Natasha starts to walk away. "Seventy years."

Abruptly, metal fingers close around her wrist. "There's someone else," the Soldier says.

She stares at his hand, suddenly afraid. "Let go."

"Who is it?"

"James —"

"Who the hell is it?" he nearly screams, and with a jolt, he releases her.

Natasha's breath hitches. A purple blotch is already forming on her wrist. Even if this man cares for her, he does not remember how to love. "Don't touch me," she snarls, and there's liquid in her mouth and it tastes like salt and maybe she really is crying.

James Buchanan Barnes used to kiss her in the dark.

"You're mine, Nat," the Soldier says, softly. "You were mine."

She steels herself. "Time changes things."

And as she finally walks away, absently rubbing her bruised wrist, she hears the Soldier say, "But I never thought it would change you."

**~x~X~x~**

**A/N: **Well, I worked my way through a forty-song playlist while writing this. It's past midnight. And I broke my own emotions into a million pieces, even though I'm the writer. And this chapter is so freaking long, but I somehow wrote the whole thing tonight.

I hate to say it, but if this upset you as much as it upset me, I've done my job. Nevertheless, I swear this fanfic will have a hopeful ending.

Please review, and thanks for reading.


	10. Little Talks (Somebody To Die For) PART5

**A/N:** I had an interesting situation yesterday with **a Captasha fanfic by DaughterOfPoseidon333, titled "A Storm Of Red."** Unintentionally, she absorbed a lot of the ideas from this fic into her own — it's not every day that someone likes my ideas enough to accidentally kidnap them! Thankfully, it was all a misunderstanding, she added a disclaimer, and quite frankly, her story still has a ton of original content. It's among the most well-written Captasha fics I've seen, and I'm reading it myself. **So if updates on this are too slow for your liking, give her fic a glance. ;)**

All right, on to the next chapter!

**~x~X~x~**

Looking for Bucky Barnes is impossible.

It takes five days for the futility of it all to begin setting in, an unspoken heaviness in the very marrow of Steve's bones. It takes another three days for Sam to voice, "He might not want to be found, you know." It takes two weeks for Steve to realize that his friend (_or enemy, or are the lines between blurred beyond definition?_) might truly be beyond his reach this time. The confession feels like a metal fist smashing into Steve's chest, breaking through his ribs to the battered heart that will never, ever stop longing for his friend.

And then Sam puts a hand on his shoulder, silent, steadying — and says, "You fought hard for him, Steve; this might be the end of the line," — and something in Steve's chest collapses like a door swinging shut, and he feels like he's screaming, but he can't make a sound over the click of the lock.

Sam drives the whole way home. Steve stares out the window, wondering if he's ever been fighting for his country, or if he was only fighting his friend. At some point, he drifts off to sleep, and his drifting mind conceives an escalator; the stairs never stop going up and away from what he once knew, but he isn't alone.

Steve wakes with a shudder, the dream gone but its imprint lingering. The sweet scent of bubblegum on a woman's breath. Sudden heat where her fingers brush his skin.

A kiss, teasing, all too quickly ending. Softer than it should be.

**~x~X~x~**

James Buchanan Barnes was a man of kindness. A man who saved Steve Rogers from more battles in back alleys than he could count. A man who defended Natalia Romanova through years of hellish training in espionage and assassination. He did not shy from battle; he did not shrink from a heroic death; he stood bravely amidst gunsmoke and sweat and blood, keeping vigil over his nation and his friends.

Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes, member of the 107th, prize of the Howling Commandos, was a soldier.

The Winter Soldier — an asset, and not a man — does not remember how to love. Kindness is an elusive phantom, an outstretched hand that he can reach for but never quite grasp. But the Soldier remembers blossoming fire, clusters of bodies in the dark, silence split by the crack of a rifle. He remembers battle; he craves it like a human would crave air. The difference is that the human craves air in order to live, but the asset craves battle because his life was stolen, and all he has left is the fleeting rush of combat, the crack of bone on bone, the smack of skin on skin.

The Soldier is programmed for obedience. Apart from a handler, he is machine without oil, a car without fuel. Useless.

If he cannot be kind, the Soldier hopes he may at least be useful.

Steve is a man (_albeit a powerfully enhanced one_,) not a weapon, and as such he can never understand. He would try to reprogram the Soldier, but that is not what the Soldier wants.

The Soldier wants a directive. The Soldier wants a handler, and Steve would only ever try to be his friend.

And so it eases the Soldier's troubled mind when HYDRA finds him — when they assure him that, even if Natalia should abandon him, there will always be a new mission to complete — when they promise him that the world, reeling from S.H.I.E.L.D.'s downfall, needs a soldier more than ever — when they insist that Steve will resist change (_because all lesser soldiers fear change_,) but with time, they can make him understand.

As they affix the restraints of a familiar chair, the Soldier turns his memories over in his head, like smooth stones in a little boy's hand. The Black Widow's kiss, such sweet poison. His handler's rough hands, quick to strike, quick to discipline. The mission (_friend? captain? brother in arms?_), his voice worn thin: _I'm with you till the end of the line._

The Soldier bites down on his mouth guard. He knows the pain is coming, knows that it will take his little collection of human things away. He knows that he has chosen this, that this may be the last thing he ever chooses. He knows that it will make him a better soldier. He is grateful.

But when the shocks come, he still screams.

**~x~X~x~**

The assignment from HYDRA is simple.

The world is different now. It needs new heroes who are willing to take the world as it is, not as they'd like it to be — or else America will bend its back beneath the weight of its own arrogant folly. The weak must fall; the strong must prevail. It is the way of nature. It is the way of wisdom.

The Soldier will show them.

This crippled world needs soldiers, plural. James Buchanan Barnes is the first. His first new directive will be to recruit the second: a symbol, a fighter, a captain of ideals.

Steven Rogers.

The assignment from HYDRA is simple. So are the minds of the rogue operatives who provide it. Consequently, none of them see the woman who slips like a shadow to their meeting place, silent as a messenger of death. None of them hear her breath hitch when she hears the Soldier's assignment.

But HYDRA is not incompetent, and as she shifts her weight, struggling to slow her racing pulse, one of their agents glimpses her silhouette.

Natasha staggers back from a hail of bullets. All at once, HYDRA agents burst from their once-abandoned cabin, pistols drawn. Desperate, she sprints back into the woods. She runs and runs until her legs ache and her vision reels and distance has no meaning. She loses her pursuers in the tangle of trees.

When she is most certainly alone, Natasha closes her eyes. She kneels in the dirt; she bows her head. Trembling, she twists her fingers into a knot of prayer.

"God." Her breathing is ragged. "God, please. Please. Oh, God. God." She imagines there is blood on her praying hands. Her voice cuts off, her throat seizing up. Her shoulders shake, tremors rolling down her spine. "Oh, God... Oh, God, not Steve." She chokes. "Not Steve."

Silence. Wind through branches. Chill in the air.

Then, a stillness. A tightening, a loosening, a gathering together. A memory, more piercing than a knife.

_If it was up to me to save your life, would you trust me to do it?_

_I would now._

Natasha opens her eyes. "Thank you," she says, even though she isn't sure if God is listening. "Thank you."

Then, rising to her feet, she runs.

**~x~X~x~**

**A/N: **My characterization of Bucky is heavily inspired by **Lauralot's unparalleled fanfic, "And I Am Always With You."**

And so we reach what will be the final conflict of Steve and Natasha: Bucky is required to capture Steve and bring him to HYDRA; Natasha refuses to let that happen. Please review, if you have the time — this story has lost a lot of reviewers lately, and I would love to hear what readers are thinking.

Thank you for reading.


	11. Little Talks (Somebody To Die For) PART6

**A/N: **I don't usually place warnings in my author's notes, but in this case, I'll make an exception. The violence at the end of this chapter will not be overly detailed, but its implications will be graphic.

I'm taking a risk with the events of this chapter; I know that. I had this turn of events planned since I finished the scene of Steve and Nat by the Potomac. But now I'm holding my breath, wondering what you'll all think, because I never expected such an immense outpouring of feedback, followers, and support. (I hit 100 reviews officially on fanfic and I can't even express how much that means to me.) Please be honest in your reviews on this chapter, but bear in mind that authors have feelings, too, and be tactful.

Here goes nothing. I'm either brave or insane, or maybe they're both the same thing.

**~x~X~x~**

The handlers are pacing and cursing. It unnerves the Soldier, though he hardly understands why. It should make no difference to a weapon if its owner is agitated — but nevertheless, a chill creeps across his skin, only ceasing to spread at his arm of metal. A dog is unsettled by an uneasy master; so the Soldier tenses, drawing his shoulders back as a dog would his ears.

"That woman," he says, his heart stumbling a beat. "Who was she?"

One of the handlers answers. "Natalia Romanova."

The name is spoken like a curse, the syllables harsh and cold. The Soldier swallows, digesting its meaning. "Natalia," he repeats. Since awakening from cryo-freeze, he likes repeating things; it's easier than trying to form strange sounds in his numb throat. "Natalia."

"Yes. That's her name, damn it."

"Natalia..." The Soldier's hand of flesh is trembling. "_Natalia_," he says again, gripping his human wrist with his mechanical arm. Why is he shaking? A rifle would not be shaking.

One of the handlers glares. "Remember the mission, Soldier."

"Mission."

"Yes, the mission. Will you shut the hell up?"

The Soldier blinks, an image swimming before his eyes. A fiery-haired woman, beautiful. Her lips are on his, rough, resistant. Her hand is on his chest, her fingernails grasping at his shirt.

The Soldier blinks again, and a handler is standing before him. "_Focus_."

The Soldier digs his hand of flesh into his hair. The woman's voice rattles about in his head.

_Time changes things._

_Don't touch me._

_It's your name._

The Soldier coughs. "My name," he says.

The handler freezes. "What?"

"My name." The Soldier taps his chest, where his heart beats. He thinks there must be a mistake; he can't recall ever having a name before. "My name... is James Buchanan Barnes."

"That woman," says the handler. "Did she tell you that?"

"Yes."

"She is your enemy and a liar."

The Soldier closes his eyes, struggling to process. Behind closed lids, all he sees is an angry, swirling red. _Red_.

(_A hidden room, fresh wounds opened during sparring. A sunset on the roof, the liquid on his lip when her teeth break the skin —_)

Words build in the Soldier's head, pressing up against the inside of his skull. There are too many to sort through. He chokes. "I think..."

"You don't have to think," the handler says. "That's why we're here to help you."

The Soldier's heart hammers against his ribcage, thump thump thump. He takes a breath, trying to steady himself. A realization wells up in his chest. "I think... I loved her," he says.

There is a split second of quiet before, with a sharp crack, the back of a hand strikes the Soldier's face. Slashes of white light cut through his vision. Pain shoots through his cheekbone and down into his jaw.

The Soldier bites his lip. "Sorry," he says, though he doesn't know what he did wrong. He lowers his head, ashamed. He has displeased his handler; he has failed to fulfill his chief function.

His bottom lip tastes like salt, and he realizes it's bleeding. He touches the cut with a fingertip, and his hand of flesh comes away red. _Red_.

(_Red on his hand of flesh, red on his knuckles where they struck her cheek, and it's absurd because her eyes are bright and laughing, she's _laughing_, she _wants _him to fight her, and they're tangled together on the mat, his knee jammed between her ribs, her fingernails at the soft skin of his throat, and their handlers are watching, urging them on, and she's on top of him now, tearing his skin, and it's hell and he only wants more —_)

The handler grips his shoulders. "She betrayed you," he says. "She left you."

"Betrayed?"

"Yes."

The Soldier cocks his head. "How?"

"Do you remember your mission, Soldier?"

"Take Steven Rogers alive."

The handler nods. There is no comfort in the gesture, merely assurance that the Soldier has done nothing to merit punishment. "Do you know why we want Steven Rogers alive?"

Why? A rifle does not ask upon whom it is trained. "I do not compute."

"Why Rogers?" says the handler, almost shouting, his breath hot in the Soldier's face. "What did Rogers do to you?"

(_Red swallowing up the vehicles on the bridge, red staining her shirt above the gunshot wound, red staining his palm of flesh as he realizes he's digging his nails into his own hand —_)

The Soldier grits his teeth. Memories come in a brutal flood: a man on a bridge; the woman, a bullet in her shoulder; the man, braced to defend her, fear alive in his eyes.

_There's someone else._

"He took her," says the Soldier.

The handler's eyes are alight, like fireflies. "Yes," he says, waving his hands wildly back and forth, and the Soldier wonders why he is so excited. "Yes."

"I loved her."

"Yes."

The Soldier clenches his hand of metal. His voice is a snarl, pure animal. "He took her from me."

"And you will take him from her," the handler says. "You will bring him to us. We will make him understand that the world needs soldiers. He will fight for us, like you. And you will have her back."

(_Red lashes across her back, red wall that keeps him out while she's screaming, red lips to speak that for which words fail —_)

The Soldier's lips peel back from his teeth, wolfish. "Natalia," he says, a jagged exhale.

"Take Steven Rogers alive," the handler says. His words are like the rungs of a ladder; each one carries the Soldier further, higher above the onslaught of memory. "Then we can find the woman. You can have her back. But first, you have to take Rogers."

Resigned, the Soldier nods. Regardless of these memories, capturing Steven Rogers is his mission, and he must complete it. Then he can worry about the woman and her touch and why his thoughts of her are red, red, _red_.

Distantly, the Soldier hears his handlers discussing something about _the cerebral cortex _and _altered processing _and _manipulation_, but he need not concern himself with such things. As his handler said, he does not need to think; HYDRA will think for him.

The Soldier needs only to listen and obey.

Wordless, the Soldier dons his armor and weaponry. He steps out into the cold, cold night. He sets aside his thoughts of love or war. (_Is there a difference? He isn't sure. In the end, it doesn't matter._)

A rifle does not become distracted.

**~x~X~x~**

Black Widow is used to running away. Running is automatic: it is her default programming, designed to keep her alive when combat will not suffice. But this time, she's running _toward _the danger, and every muscle of her body resists it.

_What are you doing? _her legs seem to scream, aching with every step. _Turn around!_

Not for the last time, Natasha remembers San Paulo — the flames licking at her hair (_it had been long back then, scarlet curls reaching past her her shoulders, turning her into a child of the flames_); the shrieking of a woman in the next room, too ill to flee, as the fumes spilled underneath doors and through blasted-open walls; her lungs spasming and her throat retching to expel the smoke; her mind knowing nothing but the need to escape. Right now, that selfsame need to _get away _has sunk its fangs into her heart, and it refuses to release.

_This isn't about you, _her instincts say. _People kill, and are killed, every day; keep yourself alive._

But this isn't about _people_. This is about Steve Rogers.

It's about a man who really didn't have to kiss her back on the escalator, but did (_slow and soft until she felt like she was melting_.) A man who whispered her name over and over, like a promise or a prayer. A man whose absence has trailed her like a shadow for weeks and weeks, a man whose distance would be unbearable if unbroken.

It's about a man who knows she is vulnerable, but has only ever made her feel stronger. A man who has seen her broken beyond belief, but has only ever built beauty out of her jagged pieces. A man who held her together when everything else they knew was falling apart. A man who knows she lies for a living, but chooses to trust her (_even when she's afraid to trust herself_.)

Natasha can survive perfectly fine on her own — she can muffle her screams when she wakes from a nightmare, she can put on a brave face for the reporters, she can fake a smile and force a laugh, she can rise like a phoenix from the ashes of S.H.I.E.L.D. — but she has caught the briefest glimpse of something beyond running and fighting and running again, and maybe for once she just wants to feel _alive_.

And that is what Steve Rogers does. He takes this shell of a girl and breathes life into it with every word, every glance, every unspoken assurance.

Of course Natasha doesn't need him. She has never needed anyone. But losing him would be worse than losing S.H.I.E.L.D., worse than revealing her bloody ledger to the world — because Steve Rogers believes in her, and it makes her want to believe in herself.

_Oh, God. Please not Steve._

And so the Black Widow runs, toward and not away.

**~x~X~x~**

Steve Rogers wakes to a smashing sound. At first, he thinks it a figment of his drifting mind. Then it sounds again, louder, and its identity registers — bare knuckles against wood.

With a start, Steve comes fully awake. He jolts upright in bed, his chest heaving, his eyes flying wide. Blinking away the blurry sheen of sleep, he all but leaps to his feet. _The shield_. He needs to find the shield —

There are footsteps in the hallway.

Gasping, Steve stumbles across the room to seize a chair. He jams it securely against the door. His heart is pounding, the same thought looping over aand over in his head. _Who would want to kill me, who would want to kill me —_

A cracking sound: bone against wood.

Steve throws the closet open, fumbling for his shield in the dark. In his panic, he has forgotten the light switch.

Another crack, but then a scream. "_Steve_!"

Steve freezes. His blood runs hot and cold, his whole body locked in place, immovable. He takes a breath. "Natasha?"

"I know it's been weeks, Rogers," she says through the door, "but you could at least get my name right."

Steve pulls the chair away. "Natalia," he says, swinging the door open. And she really is there, more striking even than in his dreams, and all other words die on his tongue. "Natalia," he says, unable to think; and then again, "_Natalia_," and he throws his arms around her. He can feel her rapid breathing against his chest, proof that she is truly here, and as it dawns on him he holds her tighter, afraid that he'll find himself holding a skeleton again.

"Steve," she says. There's an edge to her voice, but he doesn't notice it.

He takes a step away. "You came back."

"Steve." Her hands are shaking; it doesn't make sense. "Steve, I have a car. You need to grab your shield and come with me. There isn't time —"

"Make time."

"Steve —"

"You owe me that much," he says, even though he knows it's cruel (because she owes him more than she'll ever repay.)

She tenses. Quietly, she says, "I found Bucky."

The words take a split second to sink in. Then Steve grips her shoulders, a headache building in the back of his skull. "Is he all right?"

Natasha bites her lip. "Steve —"

"Is he?"

"Steve, he joined a HYDRA splinter cell."

Steve recoils, his chest collapsing in on itself. "What?"

"He's been assigned to capture you. He'll do it tonight."

"How do you know?" Steve shouts, his anger flaring. For days, he searched for Bucky, and there was no trace of him, not even a footprint left behind. "How did you find him?"

Natasha swallows. "I lied to you," she says, laying a hand on his arm. "About a lot of things."

Steve takes a step away. "Then tell me the truth," he says, his voice low. "How did you find him?"

"Steve —"

"How, Natalia?"

She chokes, her hands clenched into fists. "I knew him," she says, her eyes wild. "I knew him, Steve, and he came looking for me, and I sent him away —"

Steve stares blindly, like he's seeing a stranger. "You _sent him away_?"

"He's coming for you."

"Let him."

"He nearly killed you once," Natasha says. "Please, Steve." She takes a step closer, pressing an open palm against his chest, above his heart. "Don't do that to me again."

"He remembered," Steve says. "Before I fell. He saved me, Natalia. He remembered —"

"They wiped him again."

"He'll remember again."

"Steve," she says, her nails digging into his shirt. He can feel her breath on his neck, hot and fast. She lowers her head. "For once in your life, you have to run away from a fight."

Steve stands, torn in two. Gently, he lays a hand on her cheek, lifts her face to look at him. "I can't," he says.

"You have to."

"I can't."

She shivers — a visible trembling, from her head to her feet. Steve's blood roars in his ears. He wants to demand the whole truth from her; he wants to take her face in his hands and kiss her until nothing else matters.

Then a window shatters, and he doesn't do either of those things.

**~x~X~x~**

As shards of glass explode across the room, Natasha breaks away from him, braced to defend. But what enters the room is neither a metal arm nor a HYDRA operative; instead, it's a sleek black cylinder. The device, terribly small, rolls to the center of the floor and stops. It's a grenade – and Natasha's blood is racing so fast, her heart is pounding so hard, that she can't process what type of grenade it is – but if it is as she fears, than accidentally or not, it will reduce Steve Rogers to flame and blood and shrapnel.

She cannot allow that to happen.

There is no way to stop it (_but yes, there is, there is there is there is –_)

Time seems to stagger, tripping over itself, its progress moving in slow motion. Barely breathing, Natasha looks at him, and everything she has ever felt wells up in her voice and in her eyes.

"Steve," she says. "I'm sorry."

And Steve reaches for her (_because of course he does,_) and he screams her name (_her real name_,) knowing what she's about to do (_because he's the only one who ever believed she would_.)

Eyes closed, Natasha throws herself upon the grenade.

There is a split second of heavy silence, of terrible waiting, of her knees curled to her chest and her hands covering her eyes – and then her world is fire.

**~x~X~x~**

It was a flash bang grenade. It was meant to disorient him.

Steve Rogers knows because, if it were a standard grenade, Natasha's body would be splattered on the wall – but instead, her body has absorbed the blast of white light, the ear-splitting bang that should have deafened him, and the heat that was most definitely not intended for contact with human flesh.

Natasha is on fire. She screams, rolling wildly back and forth, back and forth. It takes several seconds for the flames to go out; then she lies still, and he can finally see (what is left of) her.

Steve stares (and stares, and stares) at the thing that should be Natalia Romanova, but all he sees is blood and blackened flesh. He blood flows relentlessly, a fierce red stain upon the wooden floorboards.

Steve drops to his knees beside her, his shield forgotten. "Natalia...?" he breathes, barely audible.

She says, "Steve" – his name something between a plea and a shriek, like it could knit her ruined flesh back together – and then the pain must hit, because she opens her mouth and she's _screaming _and it's the worst sound Steve has heard in his life.

There are words in her unbroken scream. "RUN! STEVE, RUN!"

"No!" Steve clenches his teeth together. "I'm not leaving you. Natalia, I'm not leaving you –"

Her scream rises in volume, so loud that it seems to fill his whole world, and his voice dwindles into silence because there is nothing to say in the face of this. A few seconds pass before her scream cuts off and she simply lays still, her chest rising and falling in an uneven rhythm, tears leaking out of her eyes.

"I'm sorry," she says. "I'm sorry."

There is a crash as the door is ripped from its hinges. In the entryway, the Winter Soldier stands unflinching, twin pistols holstered at his sides.

Steve stares at him, disbelieving. "Bucky?"

"Steven Rogers." The Soldier draws a pistol with his hand of metal. "Put your hands behind your head."

**~x~X~x~**

** A/N:** I know that Natasha could survive a flash bang grenade because 1) she had the Red Room's equivalent of the super-soldier serum and 2) I did a ton of research and happened upon this news story in the process:_  
January 25, 2005—NY  
Eighteen-year-old Rhiannon Kephart is hospitalized and in serious condition after she receives severe burns during a pre-dawn paramilitary raid on a Niagara Falls apartment.  
Kephart–who wasn't the target of the raid–suffered second- and third-degree burns on her chest and stomach after the flashbang grenade tossed through a window by the raiding officers landed on the bed where she was sleeping. The grenade ignited the bedsheets, setting off a fire in the apartment.  
Source: Dan Herbeck, "Woman Hurt in Drug Raid Still 'Serious,'" Buffalo News, January 24, 2005, p. B3. – Quoted from Botched Paramilitary Police Raids, Cato Institute_

I promise the next chapter will be uploaded ASAP (assuming that the readers do not in fact kill me.) This is the longest chapter to date because I couldn't find a way to rightfully convey all this in fewer words. I'm fairly certain the US government thinks I'm a terrorist now, thanks to my googling flash bang grenades like a crazy person.

Now you know why "Somebody to Die For" by Hurts is a song for this chapter – I chose it with this scene in mind. Take from that what you will. (I will not post spoilers, although I suppose you're welcome to PM me if you're desperate.)

I have several reasons for taking the story in this direction. One, Steve truly believed that Natasha would save his life ("would you trust me to do it?" "I would now") and I wanted to give her the chance to do so. Two, I wanted to move the action forward with the characters' relationships in mind, and pitting Bucky against Steve with Natasha between them puts everyone's vulnerabilities in play. Three, I can't imagine that Natasha would go back for Steve unless it was under very tense circumstances (or unless it had been an incredibly long time,) since I believe she was afraid of whatever she might feel for him.

Basically, I just want to make it clear that this was my plan from the beginning, cruel as it may be, and I did think it through. I guess I say this because I've had books that hurt me deeply with needless cruelty to characters – and if that's how you feel about this chapter, you're entitled to your opinion, but I want you to know that I considered this thoroughly before going through with it.

That's all for now. Please give honest (but not unkind) feedback if you review. Readers, I love all of you.


	12. Little Talks (Somebody To Die For) PART7

"Bucky," Steve says, rising to his feet. "You don't want to do this."

The pistol shakes in the Winter Soldier's grip. His voice is flat, every English syllable practiced. "Put your hands behind your head."

If he were alone, Steve would submit. He would allow himself to be taken away, if only out of brash hope that Bucky might regain his memory in time, were Steve to have an opportunity to speak with him. But Natasha is wounded almost beyond belief, and to submit now would undoubtedly be to condemn her to death — or worse, to enable her rebirth as a weapon of HYDRA. The weight of her fate would be on Steve's shoulders, coupled with that of Bucky's resurrection.

Steve cannot imagine bearing such a burden. He would rather die.

The Soldier's stare is made of iron. "Put your hands behind your head, or I will shoot."

"You don't want to do that," Steve says. "I know you don't."

"Steven Rogers." The Soldier aims his pistol with both hands, but the hand of flesh is trembling. "You have three seconds to comply."

Steve looks at him, searching for any small scrap of the man he knew, but winter has frozen the softness in the Soldier, turning his heart to ice. All that remains is a skeletal imitation of a boy, beaten and broken by the biting wind. He is a ghost and nothing more.

"Bucky," Steve says, his gaze steady. "You don't have to serve HYDRA."

The Soldier counts, "One."

"There's another way to live." Slowly, Steve begins to step closer. "You could have friends, not just masters. You could have hope, not just missions."

The Soldier counts, "Two."

"There's another way, Bucky." They are eye to eye now, close enough that if the Soldier were to take a single step closer, he could press the pistol's muzzle to Steve's forehead. "I can show you."

Natasha coughs, blood bubbling on her lips. "Steve," she gasps.

For the first time, the Soldier is distracted from his count as he looks to where she lies. He blinks; once, twice. Then, eyebrows drawn together, he asks, "What is that?"

In the Soldier's moment of distraction, Steve seizes hold of his metal wrist. "Drop the gun."

But the Soldier is still staring at the black and bloody thing that ought to be a woman. In a feverish voice, he repeats, "What is that?"

Steve twists the metal arm with all his might. The Soldier grunts in pain, his fingers springing open, the pistol clattering to the floor. He retaliates with a swift punch to Steve's jaw. Steve stumbles, his vision reeling. Desperate, he lunges for the pistol.

The Soldier steps down hard on his arm. "What is that?" he repeats, black fire in his eyes. "_Tell me_!"

Beneath the Soldier's boot, pain shoots through Steve's arm. He gasps.

The Soldier lifts the pistol with his hand of flesh. "Tell me, or I'll shoot you!"

Steve closes his eyes. If what Natasha said was true, then he is supposed to be taken alive, but nevertheless, there's a gun aimed at his head. He has no choice but to answer.

"That... is Natalia Romanova. I'm told you know each other."

The Soldier looks from Steve to the bloody thing. "No," he says, barely audible. "No, no, _no _—"

"She threw herself on top of your grenade," Steve says, teeth gritted. "To save me. To save _you_." He winces, his arm going numb. "We don't want to fight you. Put the gun down, Bucky."

"Stop calling me that!" the Soldier screams, and as he lifts his foot to step down again, Steve sweeps his legs out from under him.

The Soldier falls with a crash and all at once, Steve is on top of him, struggling to wrest the pistol from his hand of flesh. Natasha makes a noise that is not human (_what Steve thinks fear must sound like, in its most primal of forms_.) It is a tangle of fists and feet, metal and flesh — and when the two soldiers break apart, it is Steve who is holding the gun.

Steve wipes sweat from his brow. When he speaks, it is slow and deliberate. "I don't want to hurt you, Bucky."

The Soldier reaches for the second pistol at his side.

"Listen to me!" Steve says, aiming the pistol between the Soldier's eyes (_eyes that barely blinked on the side of the train, eyes that never looked away as he tumbled down the mountain and into the snow_.) "Natalia is severely burned and bleeding. She's dying, Buck. She'll die unless —"

"You did this," the Soldier says.

"No," Steve says. "Your grenade did."

A muscle twitches in the Soldier's jaw. "_You did this_," he howls, and in the blink of an eye, he raises the pistol and fires.

Steve drops to the ground and rolls forward, the bullets ricocheting off the floorboards behind him. He makes it to the closet and dives inside, slamming the door shut as he fumbles for his shield, his shield, _his shield _—

_So help me, God._

Bullets bounce off the closet door.

Abruptly, Steve's hand closes around the shield. Tossing the pistol aside, he shoves the closet open again. Bullets shatter against the vibranium.

From across the room, Natasha looks at him. Her whole body is shaking — she's going into shock — but her eyes are fierce, even now. They turn his blood to water.

"Bucky," Steve pants. "She's dying."

Another round of bullets pelts the shield. "You don't have the right to talk about her!" the Soldier says. He tries to shoot again, but the trigger clicks without results; the cartridge is empty. He tosses the pistol aside. "You don't even know her!"

"And you do?" Steve rushes forward, slamming the shield into the Soldier's chest. The Soldier staggers, winded. "HYDRA is taking everything you _are_." Steve brings the shield's edge down on the Soldier's spine. "I was your friend. I _am _your friend."

"You took her from me!" the Soldier shouts, shoving Steve's shoulder with his metal hand. He throws punches wildly, all predator. "You don't know her. You don't know anything about her!"

His heart racing, Steve struggles to counter. "I trust her," he says, bashing the shield into the Soldier's face, flinching at the crack of impact. "With my life."

The Soldier staggers. Scarlet stains his cheek, drips into his mouth. He spits blood, coughing.

"You have to stop this," Steve says, lowering his shield. "Natalia is dying."

"HYDRA can save her."

"HYDRA would turn her into a weapon, like you."

The Soldier's eyes shutter. He hand of flesh trembles, and he balls it into a fist. "She has always been a weapon."

Steve's heart thumps. "You're wrong," he says.

"She's not yours, Steven Rogers. She's never _been _yours."

"I love her."

At that, the Soldier looses an animal scream, lunging with his metal arm upraised. Steve blocks on instinct — his shield firm, but his arm nearly buckling beneath the blow.

"You weren't _there_," the Soldier says. "When she was _bleeding _—" He kicks Steve in the ribs, and Steve staggers. "When she was _screaming _—" Another kick to the chest, another, another. "When the Red Room made us into _weapons _—" And then he has Steve's throat in his metal fingers, his grip unshakable. He shoves Steve against the wall, his breath hot and thick in the super-soldier's face. "I walked through hell for her. Would you? How could you?"

Steve chokes and sputters, his shield arm pinned by the Soldier's arm of flesh.

Across the room, Natalia makes a sound. If it was meant to be a scream, her agony strangles it; it is a wounded, whimpering noise, and by the Soldier, it goes unheard.

"I loved her!" With a lurch of the metal arm, the Soldier shoves Steve to the floor. "And you don't even know her!"

Steve rises to one knee, his head spinning. Pain shoots through his ribs (_some of them are probably broken, but adrenaline dulls their sting_.) "Bucky," he says, tasting blood.

"That isn't my name."

"Bucky, please —"

"Shut up!" The Soldier lunges for him, like a beast and not a man.

Steve raises his shield to defend, and metal rings against vibranium, echoing through the night. "Bucky," he says again, like a desperate prayer.

The Soldier screams, swinging over and over with his fist of metal, but it's useless — every single blow is useless, useless, _useless _— and it only serves to inflame his rage.

"Bucky." Steve struggles to hold his ground. With every impact, he staggers back a step. "Bucky, don't do this —"

With a piercing shout, the Soldier throws his whole weight upon the shield. Steve collapses to one knee, his arm all but numb from the sheer shock of collision.

The Soldier looms over him, like an avenging spirit in the half-light. He raises his metal arm. "I'm not Bucky," he says.

Blood drips from a gash in Steve's lip. "Before the war..." He coughs; the motion sends a fresh stab of pain through his ribcage. "We were just two kids from Brooklyn. Like brothers." He looks up, his vision blurred. "_Brothers_, Bucky."

"I'm not him!" the Soldier says, bringing his fist of metal down upon the shield. At the impact, Steve falls forward, on his hands and knees.

The Soldier steps down on his spine.

Steve falls, gasping. His chest feels as though his ribs have been replaced with knives. Every muscle aches.

"I'm not him," the Soldier says. His hand of flesh tenses and releases, tenses and releases. He tightens the whole arm, breathing hard. "I'm not Bucky."

Steve chokes on a sigh. "Even if that's true," he says, "I'm still your friend."

Silence. It presses down upon them both, like gunsmoke after a battle.

The Soldier falls to one knee beside his target. "Drop the shield, Steven Rogers."

Steve does. It falls with a hollow clatter, the star pointing heavenward. Absently, he thinks it ironic that it matches the arm of metal.

"Put your hands behind your head," the Soldier says.

Steve looks at him, trying to speak with his eyes. "Don't do this."

"Hands behind your head."

Slowly, his eyes stinging (_and maybe even super-soldiers can cry_,) Steve raises his hands.

The Soldier reaches into his combat-vest, retrieving a set of handcuffs. They open with a dull click, and he reaches for Steve.

Barely audible, a trembling voice cuts through the dark. "James," Natasha says.

The Soldier freezes. The handcuffs are still open; he makes no move to close them. "What?"

Hope awakens in Steve's chest. There is a hole in the Soldier's programming, a name that even HYDRA could not erase.

"James," Natasha says, barely choking out his name before she cries out again, her back arching in her agony. She takes short, sharp breaths. Her whole body is seized with shaking. "Your name... is James... Buchanan... Barnes."

"James." The Soldier's hand of metal clenches. Stumbling over the words, he says, "My name... is James."

"Yes."

The Soldier stands, dropping the handcuffs beside Steve Rogers. Slowly, he walks to where the Black Widow lies, surrounded by her own blood. "How do you know my name?"

"James." Natasha gasps. "It's me."

Silence. Steve holds his breath.

The Soldier stares, blinking rapidly. "No," he breathes.

"It's me," Natasha says, blood trickling from her mouth. "It's me."

"Natalia..."

"It's me."

There is a moment of utter silence. Then the Soldier tips his head back to the sky, and when he screams it rattles the walls.

"James." Natasha stretches out a hand; it is a hideous mess of black and red. "James, it's okay. It's okay."

The Soldier's scream breaks off. He falls to his knees beside her, and he buries his head in his hands and sobs — awful, broken sobs that shake his whole body — tears streaking the sweat and blood on his cheeks.

Across the room, Steve stumbles to his feet, bracing his ribs with one hand. He staggers across the room. Heart pounding, he grabs the phone from his side table and dials.

"Natalia," the Soldier says, sobbing. "Steve." He screams again. "_Natalia _—"

The phone rings once, twice. Then, a click. "Hello?"

"Sharon?" Steve says.

"Steve? It's three in the morning. What are you —"

"Sharon." Steve fights to catch his breath. "I need your help."

**~x~X~x~**

**A/N: **Well, writing this was incredibly painful. A few quick notes here, though I'll attempt to avoid rambling.

One, I don't think anyone noticed, but I've been trying to characterize Bucky further via which arm I describe as doing an action. If his arm of metal is involved, the act is being performed solely by the HYDRA-controlled Winter Soldier; if his arm of flesh is involved, some of Bucky Barnes might be surfacing. Just thought I'd mention that .

Two, I might write a one-shot in the near future regarding what I think Natasha was thinking in "The Avengers" during the scene where the Hulk chases her through the helicarrier. I have a rather detailed headcanon surrounding that. That one-shot would most definitely be _only a one-shot,_not a multi-chapter fic, and would probably involve undertones of potential Clint/Natasha (because my shipper heart does not understand the meaning of shipping loyalty.) If you like this fic, that one-shot is something you might want to look out for.

Three, I think this story will have only one more chapter, but that depends on if it runs away from me (which happens all too often.)

Four, this story has officially hit the triple digits in reviews, favorites, and followers alike on fanfic. It's beyond anything I could have hoped for. Thank you – all of you.

Five, some of my reviews on the last chapter are among the best I have ever received. Reviewers, thanks for sharing your emotions with me. It really means the world when people react to these stories I have bouncing around in my head.


	13. Your Guardian Angel

Maria Hill is trained for proper response to trauma. She has dragged wounded agents through crossfires on countless occasions. Once, she remembers tying a makeshift tourniquet with a dead sniper's shirt, trying to prevent another man from losing (what was left of) his arm.

The man's eyes were wide, his pupils dark and lucid. "It _hurts_," he moaned as he cringed away.

"Dying hurts more," Maria said, tying the shirt tighter. "Just ask Coulson."

When the hostiles were neutralized, S.H.I.E.L.D. transported the wounded agent directly to surgery. Maria never did learn of his fate; she had other missions to complete, which left no space in her mind for distractions. She was used to explosions on the horizon, bullets whizzing overhead, limbs that went all the wrong ways. She could compartmentalize.

Natasha taught her that.

Maria can still remember her first mission alongside the infamous assassin. "So tell me, Black Widow," she asked as she shifted their car into drive. "What's your real name?"

Natasha's lips lifted at the corners, but not enough to be considered a smile; it was a predatory smirk, cold and faraway. "That's classified."

"Your skill set?"

"Also classified."

Maria drove in silence, watching her passenger in her peripheral vision. Minutes passed uneventfully. When the grenade went off (_because of course they would be ambushed on their first mission together_) — when Maria sprinted out of the smoke, coughing, her pistol in hand — she cast a cutting glare in the Black Widow's direction. "Give me one reason to trust you."

Avoiding the agent's eyes, Natasha fired her twin pistols in tandem. Two shadows, barely visible through the wreckage, collapsed to their knees. "That's two," she said.

"What?"

"Reasons to trust me."

Maria Hill would always have her doubts. Suspicion was a critical aspect of her nature; it set her above lesser agents whose fatal flaw was trust. She was always expecting a bullet in the back, always prepared to be blindsided.

But Maria never questioned the Black Widow again.

Amidst an ambush, the agent and the assassin forged a fragile trust. Time would strengthen it into a bond of steel, unbreakable. Natasha would clean Maria's bullet wounds after battle. Maria would silence her subuordinates' questions when Natasha arrived at work pale and sleepless. Sometimes, in between missions, they would go out for coffee and talk about anything but their assignments, and the world would feel a little less broken.

Maria Hill can count the things of which she is certain on one hand. Steady support from Natasha Romanoff, her sister in arms, is one of them.

And so it follows that, when Sharon Carter calls at three AM — damn near hysterical about Steve and the Winter Soldier and a flashbang grenade — Maria Hill feels like a hand of ice has closed around her heart.

"I'm on my way," she says, barely shrugging on a leather jacket before stepping out into the night. "I'll comm Fury."

As she drives, Maria tries to find her center — something to which she can safely tether herself, something to keep her grounded — but she's been sweeping up S.H.I.E.L.D.'s jagged pieces for weeks, and she isn't sure if trust still exists for people like her.

Maria is already unsteady when she reaches Steve's house. She comes undone when she locates (what's left of) Natasha Romanoff. At first glance, all she sees is raw skin and blood, and there's a sick scent of burned flesh in the air, and as fear clamps her chest, she turns to Steve and asks, "Where is she?" (_because there's only the splotch of crimson and black_,) and Steve pales at the question. He is kneeling beside the blood, which doesn't make sense if Nat—

_Oh God please no it can't be oh God oh God no —_

Maria stares at the ruined, bloody thing. "Natasha?"

The thing's mouth opens; Maria wasn't able to locate a mouth until now. "Get me... the hell... out of... here."

Maria's stomach lurches. Every inch of her feels cold. "Natasha," she says again, unable to fathom.

Natasha coughs, blood bubbling on her lips. "Get... me... out."

Abruptly, a shadow moves in the corner. Maria draws her pistol on instinct, poised to pull the trigger. "Freeze!"

The Winter Soldier steps forward, blood and tears streaking his cheeks. His arm of flesh is shuddering, from the shoulder to the fingertips. "You can't take her," he rasps. "I'm not leaving her."

"She needs medical care immediately."

"Take me with her."

Maria holds his tortured gaze. "I'm afraid that's not an option."

With his metal arm, the Soldier grips his wrist of flesh to still its shaking. "I won't leave her."

Steve swallows. "James —"

"I _won't,_" the Soldier says. His eyes squeeze tightly shut, his jaw tensing, as though he is trying to lock a scream inside of his skull.

Outside, an engine roars and then cuts off.

"That man," Maria sighs. She wipes sweat from her forehead with the back of a hand. "Always with expert timing."

As if on cue, a door opens down the hall. Seconds later, Nick Fury enters the room, sauntering silently to Maria Hill's side. Years of working side by side have caused them to evolve their own unspoken language. Maria nods to him, then gestures to the Soldier — a wordless signal.

"Nickolas J. Fury?" The Soldier stares, his blank eyes revealing that he is too shocked to move.

"No need for the pleasantries," Fury says. He retrieves a device from his coat pocket, his finger tense against its trigger. "Just call me Nick."

The Soldier blinks. "I thought I —"

Fury presses the device to the Soldier's throat, and immediately, the Soldier crashes to the floor. He twitches for several seconds, his nerves firing spasmodically, save for his arm of metal (which is designed to resist electric shocks or pulses.)

Fury sighs. "Killed me?" he says, turning away.

The Soldier lies still, unconscious. He might look peaceful, if not for the uneven pattern of bruises and blood against his skin.

Steve Rogers straightens, groaning as his (_surely broken_) ribs shift. "Was that really necessary?"

Fury rolls his good eye. "Somebody needed to electroshock his ass," he says. Then his expression hardens. "I pulled some strings at the hospital. There's a medical team on the way."

**~x~X~x~**

Every nerve in Natasha's body is screaming. She is vaguely aware of helicopter blades, of scrambling paramedics, of Fury arguing with Steve.

"I'm going with her."

"Your ribs are broken."

"She did this for me, to save my life. And if she dies on the trip to that hospital, she will _not _die alone, do you understand me?"

"You can't fix this."

"I let her go once, and not an hour has gone by when I didn't regret it."

"Natasha chose this. She threw herself headlong on to an grenade, and trust me, Rogers, she knew the implications of her actions."

"If she dies, her blood is on my head."

"She must have damn well thought you were worth it."

Natasha's throat is dry. The world blinks in and out of focus, as though a shadow is passing over the sun.

Maria is at her side, gripping the stretcher because her hand is too badly damaged. "You're going to be okay, Natasha," she says, but the color has drained from her face. "You're going to be okay."

As the paramedics load Natasha into the helicopter, she catches final glimpses of her allies. Steve screams after her, screams her true name — until Fury uses the shock device again, at which point he crumbles to the concrete. An additional team of medics is loading the Soldier into a van. Maria Hill has keeled over and is throwing up, retching until there's nothing left to expel.

Natasha takes a shuddering breath.

_I should be dead, _she thinks, and then darkness slips over her eyes.

**~x~X~x~**

The journey to the hospital is a moment and a forever.

Steve Rogers is cast adrift, tempest-tossed through a dreamless sleep. Once, he thinks he dances with the skeleton — and when he looks down, his own arms are nothing but fleshless bones — but then the ballroom turns to ash, and embers swallow the vision.

Natasha Romanoff is trapped beneath the waves, held fast by the cold and the dark. Once, her wandering mind dredges up her ledger — only it's been wiped clean, every transgression erased, because she wears the red on the outside now, plastered on every inch of her seared skin — and she thinks maybe she deserves it.

Once, James Buchanan Barnes wakes — his eyes lucid, fixed upon the nearest medic — and he chokes out a ragged, "I'm sorry," before they inject a needle into his arm of flesh.

He doesn't resist because slipping back into half-sleep is effortless and always has been.

**~x~X~x~**

Steve comes awake with a raw gasp. He turns his head, subconsciously expecting to see Natasha — but there's only the edge of his hospital bed and a _call nurse _button and a white wall, and for an instant, he forgets to breathe.

"On your left."

Steve turns his head. Groggily, he mumbles, "Sam?"

"Keep your voice down," the Falcon says, and there's an edge to his voice, but he's smiling because of course he is. (That's what makes Sam Wilson a true hero, not only a soldier; he can smile while the world comes crashing down.) "I'm not supposed to be here."

Steve blinks the sleep out of his eyes. "Natalia," he says, terror seizing him. "Is she —"

"She's still in surgery."

"Something tells me there will be a lot of surgeries."

Sam's smile turns lopsided. "Yeah," he says. "There will."

There was so much _red, _so much blackened skin... Steve cannot imagine the amount of emergency treatment she must require. Worse, he cannot imagine that she will recover.

Fear, insidious, twists around Steve's ankles. He blinks to dispel his visions of skeletons and ash.

"I'm sorry, by the way," Sam says. "About everything that happened."

Steve sits up in bed, ignoring the dull stabs of pain in his ribs. "Why are you here, Sam?"

In the hall, a nurse is giggling at something her friend said. The sound grows louder — closer — and Sam draws the curtain shut, hiding Steve and himself from view.

"There's something you should know," Sam says. "About Natasha."

"If this is something from her file —"

"You read it?"

Steve clenches his jaw. "No," he says, his voice low. "I didn't."

"Why the hell not?"

"Because I trust her."

"Let me get this straight." Sam crosses his arms. "Your agency was invaded by a Nazi splinter cell, your best friend tried to kill you — twice — and here you are, having broken half your ribs, lecturing me about trust."

Steve takes a breath. "Trust," he says, "isn't so simple. It's not about having a reason; it's about making a choice. To have faith. To believe that people can be better."

"She's a trained killer, Steve."

"But that's not all she is."

Sam shakes his head. "I didn't come to question your life choices," he says. "This isn't about her mistakes. It's about giving you some hope."

"I don't understand," Steve says, but the word _hope _is fluttering around in his chest, faster and faster, its wings beating against his sore ribs.

"Steve," Sam says, and his voice is so serious that Steve's throat tightens (_because Sam is nothing if not eternally lighthearted_.) "You aren't the only one who received a super-soldier serum."

**~x~X~x~**

The folder is thin and unassuming, but the harsh red stamp of _CLASSIFIED _across its cover marks it as far from ordinary. Steve runs his fingers over the letters for several minutes before gathering the courage to open the file.

_Subject: Natalia Alianovna Romanova_

_Codename: Black Widow_

_Primary Aliases: Natasha Romanoff, Natalie Rushman_

Steve swallows. As he lay bleeding beside the Potomac, he made a promise to this woman — an honest vow that he would not prevent her from having secrets. His heart clamps (_because he is nothing if not honest_.)

Regardless of her past, Steve is already hopelessly entangled with the Black Widow. He would trust her all the same, no matter what he discovered. But there is a part of him that froze in the ice, the part that completely and utterly believed he would walk Peggy Carter down the aisle.

Even trust is born from fear of all one might lose otherwise; it is a shout into the void, a scramble for a handhold. It is a far cry from true hope, a great distance from effortless certainty.

Steve will trust Natasha come hell or high water. There will always be a piece of him that says she can be better, stubbornly insisting that the Black Widow is her shadow, not her silhouette. But for that fragile trust to become unwavering hope — that will take time, and being huddled close together in the crossfire, and stolen glances and fleeting laughs, and promises all the better for being unspoken.

Steve will always know that he and Natasha could be something more. But for him to embrace that concept, to call her _his _and to call himself _hers_, involves taking a leap into the unknown.

The last time Steve did that, he lost seventy years. He lost his chance to love Peggy Carter.

Steve swore he wouldn't read Natasha's records. On one hand, he did so to spare her further pain; on the other, he did so for fear that his doubts would destroy whatever it is they have.

A shard of the ice that once imprisoned him remains embedded in his heart. Steve will always believe in Natasha; he is afraid to fully believe in _them_, together. Truth be told, he fears that knowledge of her bloody history would only widen that hidden chasm.

But for him to truly know her — to build beauty out of the past, and not merely to embrace the present — he must be brave enough to delve into her darker times.

And so, for the first time in seventy years, Steve Rogers breaks a promise. He opens the folder, and he begins to read.

_As an elite member of the Red Room training program, Romanova received the Russian variation of the super-soldier serum. It enhanced her endurance, stretched the limits of her physical capabilities, severely slowed her aging process, and enabled her immune system to initiate rapid healing from even the most crippling of injuries..._

**~x~X~x~**

Weeks pass.

Steve's house has been marked as a crime scene, cut off with yellow caution tape, so he spends countless nights in the hospital waiting room. "You can crash at my place," Sam insists, but Steve doesn't always listen. Often, the Falcon simply brings a blanket and a pillow to the hospital. Steve accepts these gifts with a weary smile, but he still refuses to leave the waiting room.

Bucky Barnes has been placed under quarantine, permitted to have only strictly limited contact with outsiders. Steve's presence is explicitly forbidden until later notice. Of course, notice never comes. Occasionally, nurses provide updates — he spoke several sentences in English today, he was able to tell us his name and his regiment number, he realized it was the twenty-first century before his usual nervous breakdown — but these are sporadic, and they frequently serve to unnerve Steve all the more. (_Has the world come to this, that Bucky Barnes knowing his own name is a glorious victory?_)

Natasha endures surgery upon surgery, and is usually sedated in between to spare her the agony of waking. Once, in the briefest instant of clarity, she opens her heavy eyes and asks if Steve is all right, but they inject her with something before she can hear the answer (_he is, and he asks about you every day_.)

Steve waits, and he trusts, and he prays. And he waits.

And he waits.

And one day, a nurse steps into the waiting room and says, "She wants to see you."

**~x~X~x~**

The fifth time they touch, she imagines that it won't be the last.

When Steve Rogers approaches her hospital bed, his grin is wide enough to illuminate the room. "Natalia," he says, and he kneels beside her hospital bed, his fingers twisted together as if in a thank you prayer. His breath hitches. "Natalia..." He closes his eyes. "I thought... I was afraid that —"

"I'm sorry," she says. The words emerge hoarsely; it has been a long time since she spoke.

Steve shakes his head. "Don't be."

Natasha looks into his eyes, blue blue _blue_, like they could wash her every bloodstain away. These past weeks, she missed those eyes more than she'll ever admit.

"I'm sorry, Steve," she says. "I never meant to put you through this."

Steve grips the edge of her hospital bed. "You meant to die?"

"For you," she says, holding his gaze. Her heart pounds in her throat, in her fingertips. "To give you a second chance."

"At what?"

"At who you want to be."

Steve's lips curve into a smile, achingly beautiful. "I owe you," he says.

She smiles back. "It's okay."

They sit together in silence, renewed in the presence of each other.

Steve lifts his hand from the edge of her hospital bed. He reaches for her, then hesitates. Natasha knows what he sees: a broken echo of a girl, covered nearly head to toe in bandages. She also knows what he truly _sees _— something so much more than a wounded, weary woman in a hospital gown — and the thought makes her pulse stumble.

Steve's hand trembles. "Can I...?"

She doesn't reply; only lifts her hand, intertwining her fingers with his. They sit that way for a minute or a forever (_she's lost in the moment_,) not speaking.

It has been weeks since anyone touched Natasha tenderly. Her hand isn't the only thing that's warm; heat spreads through her whole arm, all the way up to her shoulder. It settles in her chest and pieces her back together. Sighing, she closes her eyes.

Suddenly, Steve says, "It's okay, you know."

"What?"

"To have loved him."

Startled, Natasha blinks. "Steve —"

"I loved Peggy," he says, his voice cracking on her name. "I didn't know her for very long, but I'm sure I loved her." He sighs. "And you loved him."

Natasha looks away. "It was a long time ago," she breathes.

"But you loved him," Steve says. "And it's okay." He squeezes her hand. "I wanted you to know that."

She nods. "Thank you."

"Anytime," Steve says, but then his expression darkens.

"What is it?"

He swallows. "I read your files."

Natasha opens her mouth to say something — _to say anything at all _— but nothing comes out, so he keeps talking.

"I told myself I hadn't read them because I was protecting you. But really, it's because I was afraid." Steve's face flushes. With a deep breath, he releases her hand. "I'm sorry for that."

"I'm sorry for lying."

"We have a lot of things to be sorry for, don't we?"

Natasha laughs (_it's a lovely sound, and she can't remember the last time she heard it_.) "Yeah," she says. "We do."

"If I wanted to get even, I would start making jokes about your real age."

She arches an eyebrow, even though he can't see it through the bandages. "Don't you dare."

Steve laughs, and it makes her laugh again, too, and laughing is such a peculiar thing, and she thinks she could get used to it.

She looks at him, her heart pounding. "I'm not sorry for saving you."

"I know."

"I would do it again."

"I know."

Steve leans down, so that their foreheads are nearly touching. She exhales. All the tension ebbs from her body. He rests one hand against her cheek, gentle, his skin barely brushing hers, and for the first time since the grenade, every inch of her feels whole.

"I love you," Steve says.

She cradles his face between her hands. "I know," she says, and then she pulls his lips to hers.

And maybe she'll never say, _I love you_. Maybe he'll stay by her side from now on, and after every battle they face, she'll say, _I owe you_. Maybe someday he'll hold her flush against him in the dark, and she'll trace the firm line of his jaw and whisper,_I want you_. Maybe someday he'll walk her down the aisle, and she'll wear white (_without a trace of red_,) and she'll breathe, _I choose you, now and tomorrow and forever._

And maybe Natalia will never say,_I love you_, but she kisses Steve like she does. And he kisses back like he believes her.

It's the fifth time they touch, and recklessly, she imagines that it won't be the last.

It isn't.

**THE END**

**A/N: **I chose "Your Guardian Angel" by Red Jumpsuit Apparatus as this last installment's song, because I came across it while writing and listened to it on repeat for the entirety of the final scene.

I can't even express how much you, the readers, mean to me. Every follower, every favorite, every review, is amazing. I've been writing a novel since 2012, and for a while, something stopped me from working on revisions. Maybe it was fear, or maybe mere insecurity, or maybe I was intimidated by the sheer scope of the project. I don't know. But each and every one of you has reminded me why I write, and why I need to write the story that lives inside of me. I went back to revisions today. I plan to finish his round of edits before summer is over. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

I turn 17 on Wednesday, so I consider this story's completion to be a gift to myself. My parents' present to me is Philadelphia Comic Con tickets for Saturday — so if you happen to be there and you see a teenage girl, ridiculously excited, with curly red hair and a blue V-neck T-shirt that says NERD in big white letters, that's me. Say hello. I love making new friends.

I will say it one more time: Thank you. All of you.

Now I have a novel to finish, and a dream of publication to chase...

— **Shadows**


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